Hiroshima Commemoration: Living Happily Near a Nuclear Trash Heap

Guest Report by Dick Thompson of Time
May 11, 1992

DR. WILLIAM REID WAS NEW TO Oak Ridge, Tenn., and disturbed by what he was seeing. Soon after he joined the staff of Methodist Medical Center in early 1991, he was treating four patients with kidney cancers, an unusually large number for one small area, and a cluster of other people who appeared to have weakened ability to ward off infections. Reid suspected that something in the local environment was attacking the residents' immune systems.

It didn't take much imagination for Reid to figure out possible sources of contamination. For 49 years, federal installations at Oak Ridge have manufactured the innards of nuclear bombs. In the process, the plants have produced -- and carelessly disposed of -- mountains of radioactive material and hazardous wastes. Even the U.S. government admits the Oak Ridge labs have littered the surrounding countryside with everything from asbestos and mercury to enriched uranium. The story is much the same at all the country's now notorious nuclear weapons plants, scattered from Hanford, Wash., to Los Alamos, N. Mex., to the Savannah River plant. The Department of Energy has launched a major clean-up effort, but it might be too late to prevent a host of medical problems in people who have lived in the shadow of the toxic plants for decades.

Could a health disaster be hitting Oak Ridge? Reid was determined to find out.

...Still, Oak Ridge is no ordinary place. Earlier this year a visitor to one of the nuclear facilities accidentally turned off the main road. When he tried to leave, alarms rang, and the government bought his radioactive rental car on the spot. In the reservation surrounding the plants, creatures ranging from deer to frogs and water fleas have all excited Geiger counters. Contaminated trees, which take up nuclear liquids through their roots, have been chopped down and buried lest the autumn winds spread radioactive leaves. And the streams have carried toxic chemicals and nuclear products -- including strontium, tritium and plutonium -- for distances of 64 km (40 miles). Posted along the town's creek are NO FISHING signs and Department of Energy warnings: no water contact.

No one worried much about environmental contamination when Oak Ridge quietly sprang up as part of the Manhattan Project during World War II. By 1944, two years after construction started, Oak Ridge had become Tennessee's fifth largest city, and it was all behind a guarded fence. At peak production, the "secret city" used 20% more power than New York City.

After the products of the Manhattan Project exploded over Japan and ended the war, the mania for secrecy diminished. The fences surrounding the city came down, and Oak Ridge started appearing on maps. But its work was far from done. Once the arms race with the Soviets began, Oak Ridgers hunkered down to help produce an arsenal of American hydrogen bombs. A recently declassified report done for the Department of Energy found that the weapons factories "operated in an atmosphere of high urgency" that resulted in astounding environmental and health assaults.

Between 1951 and '84, the Oak Ridge plants pumped 10.2 million L (2.7 million gal.) of concentrated acids and nuclear wastes into open-air ponds, called the "witches' cauldron," from which the chemicals would evaporate or leach into a nearby stream. Barrels of strange brews and experimental gases, some so volatile that they would explode on contact with oxygen, were sealed and dropped into a quarry pool. A neatly stacked collection of 76,600 barrels and oil drums, filled with nuclear sludge and now rusting, is larger than the main building at Oak Ridge. Millions of cubic meters of toxic material, including pcbs and cobalt 60, were dumped in trenches and covered with soil. In 1983 the Department of Energy acknowledged that 1.1 million kg (2.4 million lbs.) of mercury had been lost. It went up the smokestacks, drained into the soil and flowed into the stream that runs through town. After that revelation, mercury was found at the city's two high schools and in the blood of workers at one of the atomic-research sites. An unknown amount of enriched uranium went out smokestacks.

....The culture of secrecy and concern about job security may have kept information from health investigators. Says Robert Keil, president of the Oak Ridge Atomic Trades and Labor Council: "One thing that kept people from coming forward is that they were afraid they might jeopardize their security clearance by talking about something that was classified."

The end of the cold war provides an opportunity to get at the truth. At Oak Ridge, as at other weapons labs, the threat of a nuclear conflict has been replaced by the threat of massive layoffs. The big job in town now seems to be cleaning up the nuclear trash heap. More than $1.5 billion has already been spent on detoxifying Oak Ridge, and the end isn't in sight. The government is beginning an exhaustive medical survey of the people who live around Oak Ridge, including the women. The Centers for Disease Control has been asked to look into Reid's allegations.

But confident of the outcome, the people of Oak Ridge still sleep soundly. They have lived with danger for decades and see no reason to start panicking now.

Read more: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,975482,00.html#ixzz1TXin2fqo

Hiroshima Commemoration: The Oak Ridge Conundrum of War and Peace

International Friendship Bell in in A.K. Bissell Park that is rung for soldiers killed in Iraq and Afghanistan every Sunday by the Oak Ridge Peacemaking Alliance (ORPAX)

Previously posted in Common Dreams -- August 6, 2009

Oak Ridge, Tennessee, “the city that made the atom bomb,” clearly illustrates the difficult conundrum people must face when their government decides to build a stockpile of highly lethal nuclear weapons.

The origins of this conundrum are steeped with justifications like (a) “the bomb” ended the World War II and saved American lives; (b) the weapons protect us from our enemies and have prevented World War III; and (c) the research and manufacture of nuclear products preserve jobs, homes, and the local economy.

From its beginning in 1942 Oak Ridge was an unsettling place.  Located in the lush and beautiful Clinch River Valley of eastern Tennessee, it “mushroomed” into a government “reservation” of 75,000 people living and working in the middle of nowhere so research and production of the atomic bomb could be hidden from the enemy fascists of Germany.  Unfortunately, the farmers and their families who lived there were dispossessed of their property and told to clear out in 10 days. 

Oak Ridge finally produced the plutonium for the “Little Boy” and “Fat Man” bombs dropped on Hiroshima (August 6) and Nagasaki (August 9) killing 140,000 and 80,000 respectively.  Since then, tens of thousands more Japanese have died from leukemia and various cancers attributed to exposure to radiation released by the bombs.  Nevertheless, when Japan surrendered on August 15, Oak Ridgers were jubilant because they were told that their work made a direct contribution toward ending the war. 

Life in the “Secret City” wasn’t easy for the Oak Ridgers, who were mostly civilians literally living behind a security fence under the authority of the Army.  Residents were expected to report any suspicious behavior of their neighbors and fellow workers.  Employees had to sign a pledge not to divulge any secrets about their work, which was so broken down into smaller parts that only the top directors of the Manhattan project knew that the atom bomb was actually being built!

Oak Ridge was conceived of as a temporary city with a single purpose and no one expected it would continue after the war.  Housing was made of cheap, pre-fabricated materials.  Facilities and amenities were meager and mud was everywhere. 

Soon after the war when the Oak Ridge mission was accomplished, some people left the “Secret City” relieved to get out.  Many people, however, wanted to stay because they believed that the knowledge discovered there was too valuable not to be further developed.  Others stayed because they just wanted to keep their jobs.  Then, Eugene Wigner, one of the legendary refugee scientists from Europe who provided the theoretical and practical knowledge that fueled the Manhattan project, created a new, peacetime purpose for nuclear research.  As a result, the city was saved and this new purpose came in the form of radioactive isotopes that are used extensively in medicine (especially for thyroid disease and cancer therapy), agriculture, powering spacecrafts, smoke detectors, DNA analysis, diagnostic imaging and other advanced scientific applications.  Now, the facilities behind the fence are known as the world-famous and highly-respected Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL).

Oak Ridge, today, is a thriving multicultural community of 27,000.  It has a rich and proud history, good schools and wonderful cultural and environmental amenities that make the city an attractive place to live.  ORNL and the University of Tennessee in Knoxville (25 miles away) help populate the city with well-traveled, well-read, well-educated, well-informed people who are very smart and like living in Oak Ridge.  But even this is a conundrum when it comes to peacemaking activities.

Residents have been involved in various peace causes over the years.  For example, the city entered into a sister-city relationship with Naka-shi, Ibaraki-ken, Japan, on October 29, 1990.  It also hosts the Ulster Project (http://www.ulsterproject.org) where Catholic and Protestant teenagers from Northern Ireland “build a peaceful parity of esteem between each other by building tolerance, trust, and ongoing positive relationships.” 

So far, 11 greenways comprise 1,566 acres of sanctuary for wildlife and native plants as well as trails and other opportunities for residents to enjoy nature in unspoiled settings.   Walking tours and excursion trains take people through the area’s history.

The American Museum of Science and Energy (http://www.amse.org) provides exhibits on the peaceful uses of atomic energy and serves as a “center for exploration dedicated to personalizing science and technology.”  However, while museums generally help visitors to remember and reflect on the past in order to shape the future, this one has a sense of ironic tragedy with its shiny war exhibits like a replica of “Little Boy” and a Mark 28, the oldest thermonuclear bomb in the U.S. arsenal.  I found these exhibits difficult to admire.  In fact, they were downright frightening—second only to the elderly gentleman at the museum’s info desk.  He had worked on “the bomb” and now he was breathing from an oxygen machine and living with cancer, presumably due to his exposure to radiation.

Being a peace activist in Oak Ridge creates a confrontation with the legacy of the “Secret City,” where residents resist engaging in talk or activities that might affect the ORNL’s nuclear weapons research or production.  They risk losing their jobs, government contracts, lifestyles or valued relationships in this tight-knit community and company town.  Now that is a terrible conundrum to live with.

Nevertheless, the Oak Ridge Peacemaking Alliance (ORPAX), begun in 1982, joined other Americans in their concern about the nuclear arms race.  ORPAX joined a group of “outsiders” (another legacy of Oak Ridge living where you were either “inside” or “outside” the security fence) to commemorate Hiroshima Day in 1983.  Even so, it was careful to stipulate that the day would be a memorial to those who died and not a condemnation of Oak Ridge or of the Y-12 plant that made “the bomb.”  These demands were not realized.

Since 1988, the Oak Ridge Environmental Peace Alliance (OREPA) has also demonstrated against nuclear weapons at the gates of the Y-12 plant in its Stop the Bombs campaign (www.stopthebombs.org).  It, too, holds a Hiroshima Day and since 1998 members have made over 500 presentations on WMD and militarism and invited thousands of people to Oak Ridge to demonstrate against nuclear weapons.  Hundreds of OREPA members have also been arrested for acts of civil disobedience on this issue. 

Peace activists report that their Hiroshima observances have been mocked.  Newspaper editorials have issued scathing commentaries against their anti-war activities.  During the 1990s, obstructionists tried to scuttle proposals for an International Friendship Bell whose aim was to unite the people of Oak Ridge and Japan in friendship and remembrance over the terrible death and destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki so that it would never happen again.  But this issue was eventually resolved and the bell stands tall in A.K. Bissell Park and is promoted as a must-see site on the Visitors and Convention Bureau city map. 

When the United States threatened war against Iraq in 2002, Oak Ridge peace activists demonstrated against it—and were met with counter-protests across the street by people who dismissed the activists as “way overboard.”  Nevertheless, some activists are undeterred.  One elderly woman regularly writes letters to the editor in the local newspaper about her opposition to the war despite bloggers’ labeling her a “radical activist.”

Another woman wrote a booklet for high school students on the practical realities of enlisting in the military in order to balance the influence of military recruiters.  She informed parents that the military has access to students’ records and then lobbied the school board to give parents the option of having their child receive information on enlistment.

And one more conundrum:  a lot of the local residents appreciated the activists’ peacemaking efforts even though they don’t stand with them. 

Today, members of ORPAX conduct their demonstrations “in very harmless ways.” said one middle-aged member.


“We’re not trying to get coverage in the newspaper.  And when we go out to ring the International Friendship Bell on Sundays [in honor of the fallen Americans in Iraq and Afghanistan], we do it more for ourselves in a private way.  If we were public about it, we’d put ourselves at risk.”

Oak Ridgers understand what it means to be a part of a place that has a great effect on the world—in both war and peace.  And in some ways, Oak Ridge still remains a “secret city”—for those who thirst for peace.

However, it is important to recognize that the Oak Ridge conundrum of war and peace reflects the conundrum of our entire nation.  Oak Ridge may be the place where WMD were and are constructed, but all Americans share a responsibility for what we do with these weapons.  For my money, especially on this day of remembrance in Hiroshima, they should all be banned and disassembled.

Hiroshima Commemoration: Memories and Interpretations

The "mushroom cloud" over Hiroshima on August 6, 1945

Photos supplied by  Free Info Society.

Keyoko was there during the bombing of Hiroshima on Monday, August 6, 1945. At 8:15 a.m. just before the glass of her house shattered into tiny pieces, her baby started screaming. Shards of glass covered her scalp. Keyoko looked out the window and saw the mushroom cloud hanging in the air over the city. She went outside her house looking for relatives among the piles of bodies and animal carcasses killed by the intense, radioactive heat, she saw buildings and concrete streets with vaporized shadows of human figures etched on them. People were running around begging for water.

* * * * *

The pilots of the Enola Gay described seeing blinding light fill their aircraft and the entirety of the ground below being obscured by the billowing mushroom-shaped column of smoke. Reportedly, the co-pilot could taste the fission as lead in the air.

"Little Boy" made in Oak Ridge, Tenn.

 “Little Boy” had been dropped from the Enola Gay, the B-29 bomber that flew over Hiroshima. Upon impact, the bomb generated an enormous amount of air pressure and heat and a significant amount of radiation (gamma rays and neutrons). A strong wind generated by the bomb destroyed most of the houses and buildings within a 1.5-mile radius. When the wind reached the mountains, it ricocheted and again hit the people in the city center. By the end of the year 140,000 civilians were dead. Another 60,000 people eventually died from the bomb’s effects. Three days later a second bomb, “Fat Man,” was dropped on Nagasaki resulting in the deaths of approximately 70,000 people by year’s end. On August 15, Japanese Emperor Hirohito surrendered.

The area of the destruction caused by the bomb was about 4 square miles. In this area an estimated 48,000 buildings were completely destroyed. More damage occurred from the fires generated by the explosion over the next several days.

* * * * *

Howard served in the Army during the Korean War. He is convinced that dropping the bomb on Hiroshima “was the right thing to do” because the war cost the lives of many Japanese and American GIs. Today, Howard is concerned about North Korea’s nuclear capability. “If we can’t negotiate with them, they’ll attack South Korea.” He also recognizes that North Korea is more of a threat to the United States than the Arab countries. “I fear more for my family and not myself. I could cope, but I don’t want something drastic to happen to them.”

September 11 shocked Howard. Hearing about the lost lives made him very upset, especially since it happened on U.S. soil. Nevertheless, Howard is tired of hearing about 9/11 because he doesn’t think it compares at all to the trauma the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor caused.

“I lost a friend at Pearl Harbor and it still hurts,” he says.

 * * * * *

Sister Barbara taught English in Hiroshima 1974-1994. As a volunteer at the A-Bomb Hospital where the 1945 bomb victims were still being treated, she saw people who were still badly scarred and some who were blinded or made deaf.
“The hospital patients changed my whole attitude toward life,” says Sister Barbara, who grew up during World War II and was “gung ho” to win it. “But I could see how war affected people’s lives.” Sister Barbara used to go to the Hiroshima Peace Museum every August even though it made her physically ill.
“It hurts you inside,” says Sister Barbara. “You realize that people are human beings and that something terrible happened to them.” For Sister Barbara, the atomic bomb no longer means the end of a terrible war. Instead she understands that it has become a mechanism that allows one people to hold tremendous destructive power over another people.
“I’ve seen the results of atomic weapons,” she says. “It’s enough to make you ask: why did it have to happen?”

* * * * *

Every August 6 the city of Hiroshima holds memorial ceremonies to remember those who died from the bomb. Tens of thousands of people attend. The memorial ceremony begins with a march from the Peace Cathedral to the Cenotaph, the central monument of the whole complex and the site of the stone coffin that holds the Register of A-Bomb Victims. During the ceremony the name of each victim is read. At night the city holds a lantern float on the river and people buy candles for every family member lost to the bomb attack. Peacemakers all over the world have adopted the lantern float as a memorial of this day in their towns and cities. They insert prayers, thoughts and messages of peace in their lanterns.

Cenotaph at Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum and Park with Peace Dome in background

Peace Dome today

The Peace Dome after the bomb was dropped.  The building was the former Hiroshima Prefecture Industrial Promotion Hall, Where special products of Hiroshima were exhibited and various gatherings were held until the A-bomb was dropped. Since it was located just under thehypocenter, blast pressure was vertically exerted on the bulding and only the dome-shaped framework and part of the outer wall remained. It has come to be called "the A-bomb Dome", and it has come to symbolize to the people of the world "No More Hiroshimas". As years passed, however, the ruin has deteriorated further due to winds and rain. A civic movement was started calling for permanent preservation of the A-bomb Dome, and money was contributed from all over Japan, not to mention from Hiroshima. Within a year after the fund-raising campaign was started, the restoration funds had been collected. In August 1967, the reinforcing construction was completed. That is why the present A-bomb Dome gives a different impression from that in the photograph.(http://www.gensuikin.org)

The Peace Memorial Museum in Hiroshima provides a tangible record of the grim reality of that day and about the powerful impact that weapons of mass destruction can have on a city. The first half of the museum gives visitors a sense of life before the bombing; it showcases children’s toys, books and magazines as well as a model of the city before the bombing. The second half of the museum holds shocking wax figures of the victims: their clothes burned right off of them, their skin hanging in strips like tattered rags, flesh burned raw and sometimes exposed down to the bone, eye sockets gouged out.

Many pregnant women delivered deformed babies and women who carried eight-week-old fetuses bore children with smaller heads and lower intelligence. Children were also muted, that is, their bodies stopped growing. As a result, many young women exposed to the radiation vowed never to marry or to have children because they feared what they might produce. The message of the museum is “Ban nuclear weapons and make peace in the world.” Unfortunately, the world has not seen fit to heed this message. Here is an accounting of the nuclear weapons stockpiles in the world, according to the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), and published in Bulletin of Atomic Scientists:

Number of warheads and year of first test

United States 9,960 (5,735 active) -- 1945

Russia 16,000 (5,830 active) -- 1949

United Kingdom 200 -- 1952

France 350 -- 1960

China 130 -- 1964

India 70-120 -- 1974

Pakistan 30-52 -- 1998

North Korea 1-10 -- 2006

Israel 75-200 -- undeclared