Making a Real Killing
Subtitle: Rocky Flats and the Nuclear West
Publisher: University of New Mexico Press
Published: September 1, 1999
Language: eng
Format: Hardcover
Number of pages: 320
ISBN-13: 9780826318770
Subjects: Nuclear Weapons; c 1800 to c 1900; c 1945 to c 1960; Military; Colorado - Local History; Technology; History - General History; Nuclear weapons plants; Colorado; Military Science; Modern - 20th Century/Nuclear Age; Political Freedom & Security - International Secur; United States - State & Local - General; History / United States / 20th Century; Rocky Flats Plant (U.S.); Church family; Environmental aspects; History
Description: "Just as huge nuclear explosions result from small spheres of plutonium, the story of the Rocky Flats nuclear weapons plant near Denver, Colorado, is much larger than itself. It is about the Church family, who came west seeking gold in 1861, stayed to raise cattle, watched the federal government take a large piece of its land for the weapons plant in 1951 - and now is busily developing real estate in the booming suburbs next to the contaminated plant site.

It is about the government and private corporations that produced the deadliest devices in history for thirty-seven years, concealed problems behind the wall of national security secrecy, and came close to a Chernobyl-scale disaster during a 1969 fire. It is about plant managers who cut corners to maintain weapons production, workers who saw themselves as loyal Cold War soldiers, and citizen activists who challenged the plant's very existence.

And it is about a community that profited from thousands of jobs and contracts but now faces long-term environmental and health risks."--BOOK JACKET.