## DIRTY SNOW

My name is Virginia Wisdom, and my hometown is Gary, Indiana, where the coal plants not onlypower regularresidential use, but also the steel mills. Ithank you for this opportunity to tcii how we lived, and how we die. I was born on a farm and moved to Gary, Indiana as a small child with my parents. They believed city life would give me great advantages. Gary had wonderful schools. Gary had a world-class Carnegie library. My neighborhood in Gary had a sense ofcommunity where neighbors looked out for each other and helped each other as much as they possibly could. But there was one thing we could not avoid, one thing we could not help each other with: cancer. Cancer was the grim reaper that pervaded every aspect ofour world in the form ofthe coal dust pollution that fell constantly in every corner. As young children, we liked to play outside. llowever, when the sky got yellow, the rotten egg smell was so bad that our mothers called us inside in futile hopes of avoiding the worst ofit. On warm days we had outdoor picnics. However, we had to keep the food covered, and we had to wash the picnic tables down every fifteen minutes or so, because that was how long it took for the pollution to cover everything with heavy black soot. In winter it snowed nearly every day. We had a lot oflake effect snowstorms in Gary that did not fall anywhere else. There was another thing notable about our snow: within about fifteen minutes, there would always be a black layerofcoal dust on the cars, and ifyou wiped it off, itwould scratch the cars' paint. Ifit would do thatto paint, whatdid it do to our lungs? I moved to Illinois for college and eventually opened a chain ofhealth clubs, where Itook detailed health histories on thousands ofpeople. Ialso stayed in touch with my Gary, Indiana community. In myexperience as both owner ofa chain of health clubs in thewestern suburbs ofChicago and as collectorofvital statistics for my Gary, Indiana high school class, it is obvious that the cancerrates for myformer classmates is drasticallyhigherthan for my health club clientele ofthe same age. The averageAmerican lives to age 87 and dies from heart disease or stroke. Nearly 25% ofmy classmates developed cancer in middle age--mostlythose who were born in Gary and lived there all their lives. IfIhad not moved awayfrom Gary, I, too, would probably have cancer. Many ofthose Garyites who got cancerat an earlyage represent the very brightestand best. Let me introduce you to some ofthem. My class valedictorian was Rosalie Berger. Rosalie became a lawyer and did extensive civil rights litigation. She developed cancer at age 52. She nearlydied, but fortunately she is still here ten years later.

1Doris Van Horne was not as fortunate. She was a world-class athlete. As a child, she stood up to bullies. As an adult she stood up for human rights. Even on her deathbed she was writingletters to her congressman askingfor an end to the War in Iraq. She died ofcancer atage 58. Marty Szymanski was about the handsomest boy Iever saw. He sang with me in the church choir. He sanglike an angel, and now he probably is an angel. He died ofcancer at age 57. Christine Davis was the presidentofthe studentcouncil and also chairman of our church youth group atthe same time. She had outstandingleadership skills. She died ofcancerin a nursing home atage 55. Her family said she had been in such terrible shape and so much pain for so long thather death was actually a blessing. That's what it's like to live and die in Gary, Indiana. The cancer deaths are so slow and so painful that death itselfis considered a blessing. These stories are buta few ofthe manywho lived shortand painful lives in Gary, Indiana, because ofthe coal dust pollution. I praythat theirdeaths will notbe in vain and thatthis nation, under God, will eliminate coal dust pollution, so thatour children will not perish from the Earth.