First-hand account of life in a nuclear-testing zone Shocking details of the men's exposure to radiation When he was twenty-two, Michael Harris was drafted for a twenty-four month tour of duty. The first year was spent in the US, and the second at the Atomic Energy Commission's Pacific Proving Ground at Eniwetok. On a two-mile island with no activities or specified duties, Harris needed to find a way to pass the time. So he began writing for The Atomic Times, the only Eniwetok newspaper, whose motto was, 'All the News That ...
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First-hand account of life in a nuclear-testing zone Shocking details of the men's exposure to radiation When he was twenty-two, Michael Harris was drafted for a twenty-four month tour of duty. The first year was spent in the US, and the second at the Atomic Energy Commission's Pacific Proving Ground at Eniwetok. On a two-mile island with no activities or specified duties, Harris needed to find a way to pass the time. So he began writing for The Atomic Times, the only Eniwetok newspaper, whose motto was, 'All the News That Fits, We Print'. He filed for the administrators, wrote to his girlfriend and joked with the memorable characters that populated the island. The only breaks in the routine were the atomic bomb tests, for which the men were grossly under-prepared. Without protection of any kind, they were told to simply close their eyes and turn away from the blast. The radiation took its toll: some of the men lost hair and grew weak; others went insane. For those who worked in the shadows of mushroom clouds, exposure to radiation was a daily matter of life and death. Harris reports everything that happened to him - radioactive rain, contaminated food, nuclear swims, and tragedy - with unforgettable imagery and insight into how isolation and isotopes change all men.
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Very good in very good dust jacket. First Edition. First Edition / First Printing as identified with "1" in the full number line. Very Clean Copy-Over 500, 000 Internet Orders Filled.
In 1980 ,prefatory to an upcoming shipboard tour, I attended a US Navy damage control school in Norfolk, VA. The centerpiece of the school curriculum on NBC warfare (Nuclear, Biological, Chemical) was a tired and discredited 1950's vintage movie put out by the AEC (Atomic Energy Commission) called "The Atomic Cafe". It showed actual film footage of sailors jumping into Pacific atoll bomb craters 72 hours after the test "shot", and the narrator in the segment (and throughout the film) spoke in soothing tones about the overrated dangers of residual nuclear radiation, and espoused the government position that nuclear warfare was pretty much like any other warfare except the strength of the detonations were magnitudes larger. In that class there were 4 of us "Mustangs" (direct commission officers selected from enlisted ) and about 20 very young first tour personnel. The four of us were incredulous that--with 30 years of scientific evidence to the contrary--the Navy/DoD would still attempt to allay fears of nuclear conflict with such blatant propaganda. It turns out that the propaganda started just as soon as did the atomic age. "The Atomic Times" is a superb, candid, and graphic narrative of a "test subject" who survived what is now regarded by most knowledgeable military veterans as one of the greatest breaches of trust between the men who served and the government they were sworn to serve. It is for the most part, a fast paced and well written text that traces Mr. Harris's physical and psychological evolution from the day of his arrival on Eniwetok , through several nuclear shots conducted on that island, to his present day thoughts and conclusions. For those of us who gladly followed in military service after those years, it is a sobering memoir that calls into question whether the military careers we pursued when we were "10 feet tall and bulletproof" (and woefully innocent) were simply unappreciated offerings to a deceitful government.
