by Betty Webb
And to the bullet that came within inches of killing me.
Yes, imagining Olivia seeing all that in print was pretty, but when you’re dead, you’re dead, and that’s all there is to it.
“I don’t believe in the afterlife, Gabe,” I said, because he was a man it didn’t do to lie to. “Or in the ghosts of dead movie stars.”
He gave me his sweet smile and my heart turned over. “The Duke’s kept me fine company all these years, Lena.”
“They have medication for that.”
“Anybody ever tell you you’ve got a smart mouth?” But his smile stayed where it was with no hint of strain.
I smiled back. “More people than you can count.” Oh, it was too bad he wasn’t several decades younger. Or I wasn’t several decades older.
But either way, he’d still be in love with his Abby.
Just then a busload of tourists rumbled up the road toward us. It parked at the bottom of the hillock, right where John Wayne had swaggered up to Susan Hayward and drawled his lines. People clambered out looking like they’d come straight from Sunset Canyon Lakes. The men wore sandals with white socks that reached almost to their knees; the women wore stiletto heels. Few had the forethought to bring a hat to keep off the blinding sun. I wondered how many of them had heard about the nuclear testing.
As if reading my mind, Gabe said, “You can’t undo what’s been done, Lena. All you can do is live with it.”
“You mean the bombs?”
After a long silence, he said, “That, too.”
So he’d been thinking about something else. I knew better than to ask him what. “Maybe it’s time we moseyed on back to Walapai Flats, Gabe.”
“You got it, girl. And just in case I haven’t said it enough, thank you for everything you did. For me, the Olmsteads. And for Olivia. May she…” He lowered his voice, and with the wind blasting along the canyon and throwing all that dust at us, I couldn’t quite hear his words. A prayer, maybe?
With that, he gave the canyon one final look and started down the hillock. Before I followed I took one last look around. Blood red sand. Orange and white cliffs. Black lava fields. Green buffalo grass. Like Gabe said, Snow Canyon hadn’t changed in sixty years. Maybe not in thousands. It would outlast us all.
Then I saw someone I hadn’t noticed earlier. On the butte opposite us sat a tall man on a steel gray horse, not that rare a sight in this area. Like Walapai Flats, Snow Canyon was ringed with guest ranches. Just another wrangler, probably, one with an odd choice of wardrobe. The rider’s shirt was unusual; red and double-breasted. I’d recently seen a shirt like his, but given everything that had happened in the past few days, I couldn’t remember where.
As I stared at him, the man raised his hand and snapped off a salute. Uncertain what else to do, I saluted back.
The cowboy tipped his hat and rode away.
Author’s Note
Between 1951 and 1992, 928 nuclear bombs were exploded at the Nevada Test Site—an average of two bombs per month for 41 years. The last aboveground test took place November 4, 1962. After that, all tests were conducted underground, which was supposedly safer. However, the surrounding desert floor was replete not only with mineshafts, but naturally-occurring air vents that continued to release radioactive material into the atmosphere.
Perhaps the most notorious of those domestic nuclear tests was the May 19, 1953, firing of the 32-kiloton bomb nicknamed “Dirty Harry,” because of its devastating effects on the local flora and fauna—including human beings. Philip L. Fradkin notes in his excellent book, Fallout, that “ten minutes after the detonation, the rising cloud collided with the troposphere and spread out at the 42,000-foot level, while the bottom of the cloud held steady at 27,000 feet.” The westerly winds being particularly strong that day, the fallout drifted all the way to the East Coast. Particularly hard hit, though, were the miners at the Groom Mine, located just a few miles downwind of the test site.
Southern Utah, especially Snow Canyon—and the set of John Wayne’s film, The Conqueror—lay squarely in the fallout’s path. As noted in this book, almost half of the cast, crew, and Paiute extras later developed various cancers. Many died, including Wayne.
Whenever a nuclear test was scheduled, the government told people living downwind of the testing area to simply stay indoors for a couple of hours after the blast, then they could resume their usual activities, including eating produce from their contaminated gardens. While researching this book, I spoke to a man and woman in St. George, Utah (they prefer their names not be used), who watched the tests from their porch. “The colors were beautiful,” the woman told me. “When we knew there was a blast coming, some of us in town would even picnic out in the yard to see the sight. We’d been assured the tests were harmless.” Her husband, a former military man, said, “We were in the middle of the Cold War. The government only did what they thought was necessary for our defense.”
Dirty Harry didn’t produce the only killer cloud to rain down radiation on an unsuspecting populace. The nuclear testing continued for another thirty-nine years, causing unaccountable damage to the fauna and flora of the Southwest. The animals died quickly. The people died more slowly; some are still dying.
During all the years of nuclear testing, the Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) denied the harmful effects of radiation fallout. In 1965, when the rising rate of cancer deaths in the area became obvious, the Public Health Service began a study of children in southern Utah. The findings were shocking. A large percentage of the children had developed thyroid nodules, frequent precursors to thyroid cancer. When the press got wind of the studies, government officials issued a press release that stated, “Exaggerated and unbalanced press accounts could hamper not only the government’s nuclear testing program but also peaceful applications of nuclear energy.” For years, government officials continued to insist that the thyroid nodules meant nothing, and that the rising cases of thyroid cancers and leukemia among children and adults meant nothing.
The government was lying. Officials were already well aware of the disastrous effects that radiation had on the Pacific atolls—as well as the people of Japan. Women were miscarrying hideously deformed fetuses. Children were dying from leukemia. Thyroid cancers—easily linked to high doses of radiation—began appearing nine years after exposure, and continued to appear forty years after exposure.
The American Southwest had been poisoned.
Because government officials had set up such an effective smokescreen, the first claims against the U.S. government for knowingly and repeatedly exposing American citizens to the dangers of nuclear fallout did not get filed until 1979. Then, using the testimony of the people now identified as Downwinders, the lawsuits began winding their way through the court system. At one point, it appeared that the Downwinders would win their damage claims against the government, but these temporary triumphs were finally overturned in court by the application of Sovereign Immunity, based on an old English law concept which meant, “The King can do no wrong.” In this case, the U.S. Government was King.
Finally, after the newspapers began describing what was going on in the Southwest—and the reason for it—the government struck a deal with some Downwinders. The U.S. would award $50,000 to any person who could prove that his or her illness had been caused by the testing; in return, that person would forego any further legal action. To apply for this $50,000 payoff, each claimant had to submit a 22-page application written in dense legalese, much of it indecipherable by even the brightest citizen. Most hard hit by the legalese forms were the cancer-stricken Paiute Indians, many of whom spoke only their native language. Thus, successful claims were kept to a minimum—possibly what the government had in mind all along. But despite the obstacles put in their path, the Downwinders and their children continue to pursue their cause.
It takes a lot of uranium to build 928 nuclear bombs.
Thousands of uranium mines were operating on the Navajo Reservation from the 1940s until the 1980s, when
the bottom dropped out of the uranium market. At that point, many mine operators simply walked away from their mines, leaving the radioactive waste—mine tailings—to pollute the Reservation’s drinking water. Contemporary studies report that 75% of the wells in the uranium mining areas continue to have dangerous levels of uranium, arsenic, or both. In a desert where water is scarce, this is a tragedy eclipsed only by what happened to the Navajo miners themselves.
While the mines were operating, Navajo miners developed lung cancers at twenty-eight times the rate of non-mining Navajos. Kidney, brain, and bone cancers increased, as did incidents of leukemia. Non-mining Navajos were also placed at risk. Dust from the mine tailings rose into the air, leading local officials to warn those living in mining areas not to go outside when the wind was blowing (which it usually does in Navajoland). Those warnings were useless. The radioactive particles blew onto the rangeland where the Navajos grazed their sheep, thus polluting the food supply. The problems with radioactive pollution became so severe that in 2005, the Navajo Nation outlawed uranium mining and processing on its reservation.
It also takes a lot of uranium to build and maintain America’s nuclear power plants.
After 9/11, the wisdom of reliance on Middle Eastern oil was called into question, and the uranium market perked up again, this time not to build bombs but to feed the 104 nuclear reactors spread across the continental U.S. The fact that fully half of those reactors are more than thirty years old and rely upon outdated technology is not considered a problem, even in light of the events at the Fukushima, Japan, nuclear plants.
Old uranium mines in the Southwest reopened and new ones were proposed. To date, approximately 3,500 uranium mining claims are pending on U.S. Bureau of Land Management and U.S. Forest Service land. In 2008, it was disclosed that some of those proposed mines were close to one of American’s greatest scenic wonders—the Grand Canyon. Because of uranium mining’s unsavory history, the proposed mines immediately attracted controversy. Groups leery of mining so close to the Grand Canyon and the Colorado River included the U. S. Environmental Protection Agency, the Sierra Club, the Center for Biological Diversity, the Grand Canyon Trust, the Southern Nevada Water Authority, and the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California, which gets its water from the Colorado River.
Their concerns were not without foundation.
Before the Orphan Uranium Mine closed in 1969, it produced 4.3 million pounds of some of the purest uranium ever found in the U.S. But it also dumped radioactive materials into Horn Creek, which lies within the Grand Canyon, mere miles from popular Bright Angel Trail. Campers within the Canyon have been warned not to drink Horn Creek’s water because of its high level of radioactivity. Horn Creek flows into the Colorado River.
Roger Clark, a spokesman for the Grand Canyon Trust, said, “It is a stellar example of why we can’t just trust the industry to say that they will not contaminate the groundwater.”
But in 2010 uranium mining began again, only ten miles north of Grand Canyon National Park. In support were the National Mining Association, the Bureau of Land Management, the Arizona Department of Environmental Quality, and both of Arizona’s senators, John McCain and John Kyl.
As had happened sixty years earlier when the A-bomb testing began in the American Southwest, much flag-waving ensued.
In a paper submitted to the U.S. House Subcommittee on National Parks, Forests and Public Lands, research geologist Dr. Karen J. Wenrich wrote, “We are being held hostage by dependence on imported oil. This dependence has created wars. If we are truly patriotic, we will look away from the ‘not in my backyard’ approach and salute mining to promote clean energy and independence from other nations who currently supply our fuel. With energy independence, we might not be caught in international wars.”
Sources
Books
Bombs in the Back Yard: Atomic Testing and American Politics, by A. Costandina Titus. University of Nevada Press.
Fallout: An American Nuclear Tragedy, by Philip L. Fradkin. University of Arizona Press.
In Mortal Hands: A Cautionary History of the Nuclear Age, by Stephanie Cooke. Black Inc.
John Wayne: The Man Behind the Myth, by Michael Munn. New American Library.
Refuge: An Unnatural History of Family and Place, by Terry Tempest Williams. Pantheon Books.
The Swords of Armageddon: U.S. Nuclear Weapons Development Since 1945, by Chuck Hansen. Chucklea Publications.
Under the Cloud: The Decades of Nuclear Testing, by Richard L. Miller, Two-Sixty Press.
Reports/Articles
A History of the Atomic Energy Commission, by Alice Buck. U.S. Department of Energy, DOE/ES-003. 1983.
Archives: Atomic Bomb Casualty Commission. Issues in Science and Technology, Spring 1997.
Atomic Bomb Casualty Commission: General Report, prepared by Paul S. Henshaw and Austin M. Brues. January 1947.
Dangerous Breach Suspected at Japan Nuclear Plant, by Jay Alabaster and Shino Yasa. Associated Press. March 25, 2011.
Estimating Thyroid Doses of I-131 Received by Americans from Nevada Atmospheric Nuclear Bomb Tests, a study by the National Cancer Institute.
Federal Plan to Close Land Won’t End Uranium Mining Near Grand Canyon, by Tara Alatorre, Cronkite News Service, May 9, 2011.
Half of U.S. Nuclear Reactors Over 30 Years Old, CNNMoney. March 15, 2011.
Mines Still Threaten Colorado River, Foes Say, by Shaun McKinnon, Arizona Republic, August 11, 2008.
History of the Nevada Test Site and Nuclear Testing Background, by the National Cancer Institute/National Institute of Health
Navajos Ban Uranium Mining on Reservation, Associated Press. April 22, 2005.
Nuclear Testing and the Downwinders, by Janet Burton Seegmiller. http://historytogo.utah.gov/utah_chapters/utah_today/nucleartestingandthedownwinders.html
Official List of Announced Nevada Test Site Explosions. 1995.
Radiation Effects Research Foundation (ongoing nuclear studies and reports).
Radiological Effluents Released from U.S. Continental Tests, 1961 through 1992, DOE/NV-317 (Rev. 1) August 1996.
Radiation Exposure Compensation System: Claims to Date Summary of Claims Received by 06/11/2009.
United States Nuclear Tests, July 1945 through September 1992, DOE/NV-209 (Rev. 14). December 1994.
Uranium Mining in Arizona Breccia Pipes—Environmental, Economic, and Human Impact, by Dr. Karen J. Wenrich, Research Geologist. From the Legislative Hearing on H.R. 644—the Subcommittee on National Parks, Forests and Public Lands of the Committee on Natural Resources. July 21, 2009.
Uranium Mining in Region Resumes, by Cyndy Cole, Arizona Daily Sun. January 13, 2010.
Films
America’s Atomic Bomb Tests: At Ground Zero, a documentary in four parts, filmed on location in Nevada. Contains live footage of some of the bomb tests. 1997.
Atomic Cafe (The), a collection of government films from the 1940s and 1950s designed to show that atomic testing—especially those at the Nevada Test Site—was harmless. Directed by Jayne Loader, Kevin Rafferty (a cousin of George W. Bush), with footage of Harry S. Truman and other proponents of domestic bomb testing. 1982.
Atomic Mom, a documentary filmed by M.T. Silvia. 2010
Blue Sky, directed by Tony Richardson, starring Jessica Lange, Tommy Lee Jones, and Powers Boothe. The lives of a military family sent to the test site. 1994.
The Conqueror, directed by Dick Powell, starring John Wayne and Susan Hayward. Wayne as Ghengis Khan, Hayward as his reluctant bride-to-be.1956.
Desert Bloom, directed by Eugene Corr, starring Jon Voight, JoBeth Williams, and Ellen Barkin. The story of a family living near the Nevada Test Site. 1986.
Nightbreaker, directed by Peter Markle, starring Martin Sheen, Emilio Estevez, and Lea Thompson. The story of the American servicemen who were used as guinea pigs during the atomic testing. 1989.
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