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If you are looking for a great environmental history read comparable to Rachel Carson’s [b:Silent Spring|27333|Silent Spring|Rachel Carson|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1442353674l/27333._SY75_.jpg|880193], then I absolutely would have to recommend Kate Brown’s [b:Plutopia: Nuclear Families, Atomic Cities, and the Great Soviet and American Plutonium Disasters|16248513|Plutopia Nuclear Families, Atomic Cities, and the Great Soviet and American Plutonium Disasters|Kate Brown|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1358752376l/16248513._SY75_.jpg|22279219]. I think it’s safe to say that any community, be it in the United States or Soviet Russia, that was burdened with plutonium development inherently suffered from both health and social consequences. For as different as the two country’s governments were, the sad universal truth remains that the powerful exploit the weak.
Brown looks at Richland, Washington and Ozersk, Russia, two of the first cities in the world to engage in plutonium manufacturing. Both were subsidized and presented as modern-day communities where the nuclear family could achieve a better future. In reality, the role of the nuclear family (juxtaposed to an extended family) mainly thrived as the more isolated an individual was, the more dependent they grew on their respective community.
The strongest element in this book, is how Kate Brown recounts her interviews with an almost post-processual reflection, and in a way that humanizes the accounts. It’s one thing to read about how young women were hired without being notified of the risks and given little to no protection from radiation, and another to see a firsthand account recalling how a climate of secrecy prevented college educated colleagues from sharing basic safety information with their working-class counterparts operating in the same lab.
In the end, each of these communities’ work were exploited, not rewarded. While in the spiritual sense it’s hard to envision any type of Utopia forming around an economy rooted in creating materials used for harm, it is even more horrifying to see the actual health consequences with children developing high levels of cancer, and people dying in their 30s. Downwinders’ culture is a topic for further investigation that I look forward to reading more about.
Overall, this was a great book and if this is a topic you are interested in, please give it a read.
Brown looks at Richland, Washington and Ozersk, Russia, two of the first cities in the world to engage in plutonium manufacturing. Both were subsidized and presented as modern-day communities where the nuclear family could achieve a better future. In reality, the role of the nuclear family (juxtaposed to an extended family) mainly thrived as the more isolated an individual was, the more dependent they grew on their respective community.
The strongest element in this book, is how Kate Brown recounts her interviews with an almost post-processual reflection, and in a way that humanizes the accounts. It’s one thing to read about how young women were hired without being notified of the risks and given little to no protection from radiation, and another to see a firsthand account recalling how a climate of secrecy prevented college educated colleagues from sharing basic safety information with their working-class counterparts operating in the same lab.
In the end, each of these communities’ work were exploited, not rewarded. While in the spiritual sense it’s hard to envision any type of Utopia forming around an economy rooted in creating materials used for harm, it is even more horrifying to see the actual health consequences with children developing high levels of cancer, and people dying in their 30s. Downwinders’ culture is a topic for further investigation that I look forward to reading more about.
Overall, this was a great book and if this is a topic you are interested in, please give it a read.