Epigraphs Note on Terminology Acknowledgments Introduction

Commission at Oak Ridge was “concerned with the long-term radiological
effect that enriched uranium may have upon production employees who
have inhaled dusts, mists and fumes of uranium.” Accordingly, uranium
injections were given to Massachusetts General Hospital patients following
their tumor operations, in order to obtain “data on the distribution and
excretion of uranium in these patients” and to “determine the permissible
intravenous dose.” S. R. Bernard and E. G. Struxness, A Study of the Distribution
and Excretion of Uranium in Man, An Interim Report, ORNL-2304,
Box S09F01B294, ACHRE, RG 220.
9. Morgan interview, January 6, 1995, by Gil Wittemore and Miriam Bowling,
p. 109, ACHRE, RG 220.
10. And as an early member of a group of scientists known as the American
Conference of Government and Industrial Hygienists (ACGIH), Hodge
helped set standards for the “threshold” levels of chemicals and contaminants
that millions of citizens breathe in factories and mills.
11. Advisory Committee on Human Radiation Experiments, Final Report
(Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1995).
12. The biomedical work had continued during the cold war at the Rochester
Atomic Energy Project (AEP), funded with millions of dollars from the
federal Atomic Energy Commission.
13. In the 1930s generally workers had contracted jaw cancer from licking their
brushes as they painted radium onto watch dials. The poisoning was widely
reported in the press and guided the Manhattan Project in its insistence on
secrecy to prevent similar lawsuits or bad publicity. For example, in a letter
to Charles Keller of the AEC Declassification Branch, L. F. Spalding of the
Insurance Branch contemplates declassifying a medical document “Biochemical
Studies Relating to the Effects of Radiation and Metals” by Samuel
Schwartz. Spalding warns that “the contents thereof might arouse some
claim consciousness on the part of former employees” and writes that “in
the event latent disabilities due to the exposures reported in this document
should result in publicity similar to that which arose out of the “radium dial”
industry, the public relations section would be involved.” When Guttman’s
team asked in 1995 for the files of the AEC Insurance Branch, he recalled,
nobody at today’s DOE had even heard of the Insurance Branch. Finding
the old documents was like “asking my nephew for his grandfather’s stamp
collection,” Guttman said.
14. AEC Memorandum dated October 8, 1947, to Advisory Board on Medicine
and Biology, “Subject: medical policy,” Document DOE #1019707, also
marked RHTG Classified Docs, Box RHA 248-7 2 of 3, Building 2714.H,
Vault. Via Peter Eisler, USA Today.
15. “Questions of General Policy,” November 16, 1943, Md 319.1 Report Medical
Ferry Box 25, Manhattan Engineer District Accession #4nn 326-85-005,
Atlanta FRC, RG 326. See also Jack Hein interview with UK journalist Bob
Woffinden, at timecode 04:18:55 1997; “They also did extensive studies on