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3.98 AVERAGE
3.98 AVERAGE
2022 Book 18
Full Body Burden
"Full body burden is the total and measurable amount of toxic chemicals and pollutants that have accumulated in the body of a human being since birth."
This book is an autobiographical account and well researched documentary of growing up downwind from Rocky Flats Nuclear plant outside of Denver, CO during the cold war era. What happened behind the scenes in this and other atomic age facilities was largely kept secret in the name of national security. We knew little about the long term dangers of plutonium and radioactivity in those days.... workers and the local populations were exposed to more than they imagined and the safety of many areas is still in question.
The historical perspectives revisited in this account range from global alarm to an intimate look at the lives of families depending on the jobs this nuclear plant provided. I was particularly struck by the innocence of the children who played in the watershed streams, drank the water and breathed the dust contaminated by its proximity.
I listened to this book and questioned the claims of government coverups with skepticism... how could they shrug off public safety concerns?! But the author's meticulous descriptions including details about research methods and comparisons to other locations convinced me that short cuts were taken, accidents minimized and risks understated behind the veil of national security concerns.
Questions still remain about opening Rocky Flats for public recreational activities. Before we compound the mistakes made, perhaps we need to resolve the discrepancies and err on the side of caution for a change.
A thought provoking look at history and a look to the future - focusing on our own back yard. This exposė, coupled with personal stories of families growing up nearby reminds us of the very real consequences of our actions. Let's hope the lessons learned are not repeated.
Full Body Burden
"Full body burden is the total and measurable amount of toxic chemicals and pollutants that have accumulated in the body of a human being since birth."
This book is an autobiographical account and well researched documentary of growing up downwind from Rocky Flats Nuclear plant outside of Denver, CO during the cold war era. What happened behind the scenes in this and other atomic age facilities was largely kept secret in the name of national security. We knew little about the long term dangers of plutonium and radioactivity in those days.... workers and the local populations were exposed to more than they imagined and the safety of many areas is still in question.
The historical perspectives revisited in this account range from global alarm to an intimate look at the lives of families depending on the jobs this nuclear plant provided. I was particularly struck by the innocence of the children who played in the watershed streams, drank the water and breathed the dust contaminated by its proximity.
I listened to this book and questioned the claims of government coverups with skepticism... how could they shrug off public safety concerns?! But the author's meticulous descriptions including details about research methods and comparisons to other locations convinced me that short cuts were taken, accidents minimized and risks understated behind the veil of national security concerns.
Questions still remain about opening Rocky Flats for public recreational activities. Before we compound the mistakes made, perhaps we need to resolve the discrepancies and err on the side of caution for a change.
A thought provoking look at history and a look to the future - focusing on our own back yard. This exposė, coupled with personal stories of families growing up nearby reminds us of the very real consequences of our actions. Let's hope the lessons learned are not repeated.
Read for potential to be used in my new War and the Environment class, this is a memoir of growing up in the area around Denver in a town dominated by the Dow (then Rockwell)-operated plant that made plutonium triggers for nuclear weapons and which suffered several near catastrophic accidents which (barring some purely dumb luck like a firetruck knocking out the power lines) might have obliterated Denver. While I have read more focused historical studies, having this in the form of a memoir highlights the culture that made it all possible--on the small scale, it was normal to drink and drive without seatbelts, smack around your wife and consider the wave of testicular cancer in high school boys to be an embarrassment instead of a wake-up call, making large scale contamination and cover-up possible. Iverson deals with the problems people have when the local source of jobs and income is also killing them in a personal way, documenting her own shift from being irritated by the dirty lazy hippies to appreciating that the nuns who went to federal prison for protesting had a significant point.
Author simultaneously reflects on upbringing near, and shines a spotlight on, the Rocky Flats, Colo. nuke weapons manufacturing complex.
Disturbing, important, recent history
(I knew about Rocky Flats, near Denver, from my parents having mentioned it, but did not realize how recently heavy stuff going on at Rocky Flats, including up through 2000 -and many serious present day ramifications)
I am blown away by the scope of this story. It is a story that needs to be told and heard.
(I knew about Rocky Flats, near Denver, from my parents having mentioned it, but did not realize how recently heavy stuff going on at Rocky Flats, including up through 2000 -and many serious present day ramifications)
I am blown away by the scope of this story. It is a story that needs to be told and heard.
Great book. Very interesting for those of us living in Colorado on the Front Range.
A rare, effortless blend of memoir and historical account of a tragedy and cover up right in my backyard. It was a literal chore to put this book down: I appreciated how detailed the author intertwined the minutiae of her life into the historical narrative of the plant. By doing so, she provides specific examples of how people living in Golden, Arvada, and Westminster became so unknowingly and innocently exposed. It heightens the tension and dread that keeps you turning the page.
Poignant and scary story about growing up radioactive....and how everyone just "accepted" that the waste plutonium stayed where it was put, not crossing an imaginary line.
challenging
dark
emotional
informative
reflective
sad
medium-paced
challenging
emotional
informative
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
This is a must read, for anyone living in the Front Range, for anyone interested in the nuclear world, and honestly, for everyone. Incredibly well written, a biography woven into the mind blowing history of Rocky Flats that is still in progress.