Love Canal: Even Dirtier Than It Sounds | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

[Music]. welcome to stuff you should know a. production of iHeart. [Music]. Radio hey and welcome to the podcast I'm. Josh and there's Chuck and Jerry's here. too and this is stuff you should know. the I can't believe this happened but I. can totally believe it Edition Oh I. thought it was the Romantic. Cruise in the gondola Edition I know. you'd think so by the name of it Love.

Canal Love Canal sounds so wonderful for. sure it does um the Love Canal no the. Love Canal we're talking about today is. not wonderful or nice at all uh even. before it was filled with toxic waste it. was not so great to begin with. spoiler yeah Love Canal is filled with. toxic waste as we'll see Love Canal was. an incident in American history where uh. America came to grips with the idea that. all the toxic waste that had been.

burying for the last century essentially. yeah um was starting to intrude into the. ground and that there was way more than. just water pollution or air pollution. there was such a thing as ground. pollution and all of a sudden all the. toxic waste sites around the United. States suddenly seem like ticking time. bombs thanks to one that actually went. off that's right and uh supplementary. material are uh did we do one on super. funs I know we did one on Brownfield. remediat.

that's the closest I think we came okay. that that was an old one though but you. know if you're into that kind of thing. or maybe landfills too yeah if you're a. remediation fan check it. out uh but for this one we should go. back in time. correct yeah let's go back all the way. back to the. 1890s we're going to head on up north to. Niagara Falls New York not just the. Falls but the city there's a city called. Niagara Falls and it is where you would.

stay if you were honeymooning in Niagara. Falls which is something that people did. for a very long time yeah we we also did. one on going over Niagara Falls in a. barrel totally did thats if you're a fan. of barrels check it out that feels like. one of those that had to be like an. early 15 minute episode oh I I I really. think it was like on par with more like. five oh okay it was a long long time ago. yeah so 1890s we are in Niagara uh we. look to our right and we see see a. gentleman named William T love he says.

hello he says hi there he's very excited. because he said I've got an idea for you. guys nagra Falls is doing pretty great. here it's powering a bunch of uh there's. a bunch of industrial Mills around but I. have a vision that we can make this. better we can build a model City if we. just divert uh part of this Niagara. River over there on lewison Ridge and. then he pointed that away whichever way. that was sure and he said we can double.

our Hydro electric output if we do that. it's just four miles down river and we. can build this amazing neighborhood that. has electricity and telephone lines and. anything you would want and like I said. we'll call it model City and all you got. to do is let me build Love Canal you. don't have to name it that right but. it'll be seven miles long 80 ft wide and. 15 ft deep and that's all we need to do. yeah so he wanted to set up a new fall. he wanted to create a man-made. human-made waterfall to generate.

hydroelectric power which would power. this amazing um town that he was. building I mean cuz that was quite a. draw electricity telephones gas lines. sewer lines in the 1890s like he would. have gotten some piers and he got some. investors for sure and also in a what. would become a long-standing tradition. the city of niaga Falls gave this random. person cart Blanc to exercise eminent. domain and take people's land to a canal.

from the Niagara River to a different. part to divert some of it to just do. some really serious stuff and he's he. got a lot of people interested but two. things happened that killed the model. City plan of William TLO first the um. Panic of 1893 it was a a huge economic. meltdown in the 1890s scared a lot of. investors they wanted sure things from. that point on and then the second thing. was Nicola Tesla he came up with the the. method of longdistance uh electrical.

transmission the whole reason William T. love wanted to build this Electro Hydro. Electro plant is because you needed. close by electrical generation to power. stuff Tesla said you don't need that. anymore so at that point williamt love. just threw up his hands and moved to I. think uh on some rural part of Ontario. he went North yeah very interesting. seems like he goes south after that you. would think so but he didn't he went. North and it was like I can't remember.

it was like the the name of the town was. rats something it was not it was not a. pleasant place to be but he left behind. a legacy of sorts didn't he he did he. left behind uh you know they got started. on the dam or I'm sorry on the canal uh. because I think damn when I think hydro. electricity look at me yeah uh not seven. miles but one mile of this thing had. been dug and so it's there it's um you.

know I don't know if it was the full 80. ft wide and 15 ft deep and a mile long. but it was a huge dug up swath of Earth. and so the city is like all right well. now we got this here I guess uh you know. kids are swimming in it in the summer. and they're skating on it in the the. other 10 months out of the year and in. the 1930s a company came along the. hooker electrochemical company uh which. made industrial chemicals and Plastics. and pesticides and all kinds of stuff.

and they said I would like to buy that. land because we would like to uh or we. would like to buy that land because we. would like to do what everyone else does. when they have toxic waste and that's. bury it in steel drums and that's a. you've already dug the hole for us so. exactly you did a lot of the work up. front and we'd like to buy it so we can. stick our drums in there yeah William T. love. inadvertently um dug out a a trash pit. yeah that the hooker company was like. heck yeah um I looked up the dimensions. I think it was something like 3,000 ft.

by 10 ft Deep by I think 20 or something. feet across so it covered like 16 Acres. essentially um and that's a lot you can. fit a lot of waste in a 10ft deep pit um. that's 16 Acres total surface area and. they did they ended up so because they. they the hooker company didn't make the. products that kill us they made the. ingredients that people put into the. products that kill us mhm so like they. created the dioxins and the pcbs and.

stuff that plastic manufacturers and. pesticide makers used in their products. so the stuff they were throwing away as. waste was as deadly as it gets. essentially like just the most toxic of. toxic waste but at the time people. didn't realize that they knew you didn't. want to be around it or get it on your. skin or breathe it in but they did not. realize the extent of toxicity of some. of these things no not at all and they. ended up over a 9-year period uh bearing. close to 20 2,000 tons of this stuff in.

the Love Canal and like you said every. every toxic compound and uh dioxin and. carcinogen you can think of practically. is in there yeah and like like you were. mentioning it wasn't you know it wasn't. like it is today obviously first of all. the fact that you could do that at all. MH but the way they did it you know if a. lid popped off after it was in there. they didn't send someone down there to. to seal that lid uh if one of the drums. uh got cracked or something they didn't. say oh well let's get down down there. and get that drum out of here and repair.

it or or put the waste in a new drum. they were just like it's probably fine. they're hosing their their hands and. clothes off with the hoses of nearby. neighbors and all of a sudden you know. problems start happening kind of right. away you know groundwater is rising some. of these drums are rusting and stuff. starts leeching pretty quickly so they. said all right we've filled this thing. about as full as we can full it uh not. just them but I think like all like. local the city of niagar was dumping.

stuff in there and like all kinds of. people were dumping stuff right the Army. dumped a bunch of stuff as well it was. not just hooker but they were Far and. Away the largest contributor to the the. toxic waste pit yeah for sure so this. thing gets full they said all right we. got a 16 acre landfill basically we're. going to cap it with some clay shovel. about a foot and a half a top soil on it. and call it a day and here's what we'll. do city of Niagara uh we would like to. sell it back to you just for a dollar.

yeah the city of Niagara Falls um like. hooker is the biggest um uh employer. there right so this seemed like a real. like a benefactor type situation like. this this company that that was like. caring for the community by employing. all these people was also showing it. cared for the community by basically. donating a decent sized chunk of land. for the the town to build a new. elementary school on oh man and that's. what the town did it yeah is in a. certain ghoulish way for sure it's a.

laugh of irony not uh right exactly um. so that that's exactly what they did the. city of Niagara Falls paid $1 to Hooker. a chemical company um and it took. possession of this the swath of land. that contained this toxic waste pit and. gave it to the board of education and. said build a school and you might think. that that is madness and that's nuts and. that probably the hooker company was. trying to keep all this under wraps and.

apparently that is not the case hooker. even in the deed you can read the deed. um where they transferred ownership of. land to the city it says like hey. there's waste down there and you don't. want to touch it but you guys are taking. possession of this stuff and it's now. your responsibility so they weren't like. trying to pass off something that they. knew was like a ticking Time Bomb from. everything I can tell instead they were. like we can't use this anymore you guys. should use it just don't build anything. with a basement. nearby yeah uh I mean they did say we're.

not liable for anything like that was. definitely in the agreement yeah but. they also like they literally brought. members of the school board out there. and they dug holes I think like eight. holes in the ground and said look this. stuff is 4 feet down you can see these. these barrels uh no basements like don't. do any underground piping yeah don't. subdivide it for homes like you should. not do that stuff but apparently school. board was broke uh they did it anyway so.

you know the the blood is on the hands. of uh the school board as well as the. city and the hooker Chemical Company. yeah this is one of those things where. like when you read the histories of it. in retrospect like there's clear Heroes. there's clear villains there's clear you. know um indifference that's just. criminal um and all of that is true it. it does exist but it's definitely more. nuanced than that it's not nearly as. clear cut as you know you might read in.

a single article about Love Canal and. that's part of it hooker takes a lot of. the blame and part of it is definitely. fairly and part of it is not at all. fairly for sure but the one group that. seems to have really. been just basically the pits from any. angle I can find is is the the city of. Niagra Falls the managers who who the. mayor the city council they just were. not good they were not in any kind of. position to take on what was about to. happen in the the neighborhood that was.

now Called Love Canal that had build up. around the school I think that's a good. spot for a break sure it is I mean it's. kind of early but I mean that's as good. as a nagra fall style Cliffhanger as you. can get right that's right people are. hanging off a Lon Ridge yeah their. barrels are just dangling from their. toes all right we'll be right back then. and tell you what started happening. pretty quickly after. this.

[Music]. [Music]. all right so we mentioned Elementary. School uh what better to do on a a. chemical waste stump. uh there in Springfield then to build.

the 99th Street. School uh this school if you look at a. map is was built right in the center of. where this landfill was yeah even just. taking the toxic waste out of account. the the stability of the ground it's. like scary just looking at like a a. hokey map of it no totally I didn't. think about that like foundationally it. probably wasn't that you know firm you. know no so they completed the school in.

1955 uh even though they said hey don't. subdivide this for homes they were like. are you kidding me people want to live. near the school so the neighborhood that. was known as Love Canal had about 800. houses and about 240 apartments and. right away those was uh I think this was. all completed the school in 55 yeah uh. and starting in like two or three years. later problems started happening people. were coming down with with physical. symptoms that were.

horrifying yeah I think uh 1958 some. kids um were taken to the hospital for. treatment of chemical. burns um yeah that's just a few years of. the of the school opening the following. year a family called the vores found. that there was black sludge seeping. through their basement walls it's like a. horror movie yeah that I mean I think. that's literally part of Amityville. Horror at the end isn't there like black. sludge seeping through the walls yeah I. mean I think there's more than one movie. that does the old black Sledge trick.

well this is where they got it was from. the families of Love Canal in the late. 50s um there's another thing I turned up. um there were the kids in the area loved. to play with fire rocks that they found. um there was a kind of rock they found. that if you threw it in another rock or. threw it at a hard surface sometimes it. would explode Catch Fire one kid put. some some of these fire rocks in his um. pockets and ran home and the friction. caused the firew rocks to catch fire and. burn the kid quite badly and so of. course people started investigating.

they're like th that's chunks of white. phosphorus and you kids should probably. stop playing with that it was like that. yeah yeah totally um the fire chief sent. uh I believe a report to the city. manager of what he said were obnoxious. uh odors um of course we can apply the. sick erit. scriptum because he meant noxious sure. he also said it was irritating to the. lungs and we should probably do. something about this and that was. 64 yeah and then all of a sudden babies.

start uh being born that have. disfigurements that have disabilities uh. deafness this one baby in the Scher. family was born with a second row of. teeth among other things mhm uh really. alarming stuff so Flash Forward uh. that's 1968 by the. 1970s people are just living there it. looks like a regular. Suburban uh you know Northeastern. Suburban neighborhood some of the. residents may have known about this that.

were in the know but probably not many. of them uh there was a lot of uh series. of winters in a row with like tons of. rainfall tons of snow tons of lakes. freezing and this all just melts into. that groundwater system and carries the. stuff even further through the. groundwater system and the canal itself. became so saturated that like these some. of these barrels started like rising up. through the surface of the Earth yeah. and all the ones that were already open.

and had been leaking over the years were. now really spilling their contents and. that stuff was being pushed up and out. um of the relative safety of the the. canal the pit you know like now it. wasn't even being held by the canal any. longer it was like in the ground um this. was in people's backyards there was a. there was a ball field nearby that um I. saw that it swelled and contracted like. a bowl of gelatin whenever whenever. heavy equipment drove across it because.

it was so saturated and just ready to. pop this was a baseball field um a a. pool popped out of the ground and was. floating on um toxic chemicals like. pools of toxic sludge were starting to. appear in people's backyards because the. ground was so saturated and there was. some really toxic stuff in the ground so. you put those things together all of a. sudden people's backyards are are toxic. waste sites and some like you said some. had no idea that that was there the 70s.

yeah absolutely uh you know all manner. of wildlife of course is dying uh trees. are dying Landscaping is dying back. people are losing their hair pets are. losing their hair uh all of a sudden. there's you know breathing problems. there's uh numbing there's fatigue. there's blood in people's stools and. eventually uh in 1976 the Niagara. Gazette uh publishes the very first. article that says hey this uh this. nightmare the that's happening all. around us by the way has a reason behind.

it and it's because the Love Canal and. hooker chemical got together and it's a. toxic waste dump basically yeah and all. a lot of these residents are like for. the very first time learning what's. going on and probably going oh my God. you know so much of my life makes sense. now yeah those 55 gallon drums that were. popping out of the the creek beds that. makes sense now I understand it now but. I mean it was so I think even the people.

who were used to had grown up throwing. fir rocks at one another and were like. used to the idea that there was some. weird stuff around maybe even knew there. was a dump site nearby yeah um this was. now in their backyard thanks to the. Blizzard of 77 that dumped so much snow. on that eventually trickled in and then. saturated the ground this it brought it. into the the sunlight and now there was. just no denying it whatsoever and then. the the Niagara Gazette like you said. brought it further into the sunlight so. it was such an obvious problem out of.

the gate that um the city of Niagara um. hired the calpan. corporation they do all sorts of like. freelance testing and stuff and they. investigated they went to some of the. the basements that were um emitting. black sludge and checked the sump pumps. and they did some air testing and they. checked the sewer lines and um as the. data started to roll in while they were. doing this testing um there was a a. really dramatic moment where all of of. the calpan people got in their cars and.

sped away as fast as they. could in the movie that's exactly what. would happen and then they just like. they throw a a file out the window and. it slides to the feet of the mayor and. in that file is the data which basically. says this place is a. disaster uh the levels of of toxic. compounds um is is truly uh horrifying. we're out of here uh but um nothing. happened they didn't disclose the the. report and the findings from that report.

the city of Niagara didn't uh so the. drum beat keeps happening from the. Niagara Gazette over the course of. 7778 they're still doing this these. reports uh no one is still doing. anything cuz like you mentioned at the. beginning hooker chemical is still there. there's still a a huge employer for that. town and it's a huge expense to clean. this stuff up so there they weren't. eager to bring this like fully into the. light and say all right we got to do. something about it no so the city had a.

I saw what was described as an. incestuous relationship with hooker. chemical um there was a time where. hooker was um suspected of of leaking um. waste elsewhere in the city and so um. they hired hooker chemical to go take. samples and analyze it to find out if. they were that kind of stuff MH um in. addition to not wanting to tick off. hooker um they they were also really. worried about tourism CU like I said. like this was a time where if you.

honeymooned and you you know were. working class or middle class um you. would you there's a good chance you. would travel to Niagara Falls and. honeymoon there so tourism was a big. part of their economy they didn't want. to be like come to Niagara Falls we got. the falls and a toxic waste dump too. yeah so people are like we need to keep. this quiet that was the city's position. we need to keep this quiet we need to. deny we need to obus skate that was the. whole thing that they they tried to do. um and it it got the as word got out um.

people started kind of castigating the. mayor and the city council I saw that I. couldn't find the actual video but I saw. reference to um an episode of the. Donahue show Phil Donahue uh and he had. the mayor on Michael ol Laughlin and. apparently Donahue compared him to the. mayor from Jaws only cared about keeping. the beaches open which I thought was. kind of Apt I can hear and visual Don. Hugh doing that with his righteous.

indignation I can imagine Phil Hartman. doing Phil Don Hugh doing that man God. what a loss I think about Phil Hartman. about once a month I feel like well. there you go there's your monthly. reminder yeah so sad uh we should do a. show on him at some point it's a good. idea that'd be kind of awesome so uh. they got a health commissioner uh Dr. Francis Clifford and he came along and. he said you're all hypochondriacs this. is just an odiferous nuisance really uh. it's like you're just smoking a few.

cigarettes or something it's really no. big deal uh here if you have a basement. and you've got sludge and stuff here's a. a window fan uh on us yeah and that that. should take care of it you can thank us. later and all of this is happening and. being buried and we we mentioned promise. of a hero MH and in. steps a remarkable human being named. Lois Gibbs who lived in the area who had. a uh no further than a high school.

education was a stay-at-home mom but she. knew what was the writing was on her. wall in black sludge and she knew what. was happening and went to the school. board and was like I don't want my son. going to the school yeah I I want to. pull him out of school and they said no. no no no no we can't do that because. this the word will get out everyone will. freak and this there won't be a school. anymore and she said well I am a I'm a. mad mom and I'm not going to take it so. even though I have no history of.

activism or organizing or anything I'm. going to start I'm going to get some. other parents together I'm going to. start the Love Canal parents movement. which would become the Love Canal. homeowners association and we're going. to wreak havoc on your head through the. Press she said close the beaches yeah. exactly so yeah I think Lois Gibbs I. want to say like she's an example of. what a a person can do when they're. they're left without choices and being.

ignored by the people who are supposed. to be helping them yeah but there's a. lot of people who would have just. probably given up yeah so she is. remarkable in that sense for sure. totally so she she headed the Love Canal. homeowners association for a couple of. years this thing went on for so the. blizzard of 77 happened at the beginning. of. 1977 um things really started to just. kind of creep out in. 76 this went on until 198 0 and the. homeowners association had to fight.

every day tooth and nail to get somebody. to do something about this um and what. they had to do first was to show that. these complaints of um congenital uh. disorders of weird cancers rectal. bleeding apparently more than one person. had rectal bleeding there liver um liver. uh problems kidney problems that this. wasn't just like some random assemblage. of defective people as one of them put.

it like this was uh they were being. poisoned by the toxic materials that. were flowing into their neighborhood. from this overflowing toxic dump and the. bureaucracy the city government did. everything it could to say no your. hypochondriacs just sit down and shut up. yeah until they couldn't uh it finally. uh because of the newspaper because of. Lois Gibbs and the homeowners. association raised so much hay they.

finally said all right the state steps. in uh the New York State Health. Department launched uh an investigation. in 1978 yeah they stepped in and they. said city of niagar we got this and. winked at them yeah exactly so they did. all kinds of testing to the soil to the. air uh did Health histories and blood. tests and uh stuff of the residents and. you know the results were what you were. kind of talking about these birth. defects uh the the liver problems I. think the uh 35 % of women had uh.

miscarriages which is you know higher. than average uh they say you know 10 to. 20% some say up to 25 to 30% of. pregnancies into miscarriages but uh. nothing goes as high as 35 so that was a. high number yeah and then finally in. August of 78 the State Health. commissioner Robert uh whan Robert Big. Bob whan said a uh Health Emergency is. being declared uh if you are pregnant if. you have kids under two you should leave.

the area and this wasn't some you know. um super uh upper upper class affluent. area they couldn't just pack up and. leave so they were mad they were like. what do you expect us to do we live here. yeah these were people who were tied to. this area by their mortgages um I saw. the average income was between 10 and. $25,000 which at the time is like 47 to. 118,000 today so like pretty squarely. middle class um but not the kind that.

can just be like okay I'm walking away. from my mortgage here's my house Bank. I'm just going to go start life. elsewhere they couldn't do that they. were they were stuck there with these. houses that it was becoming increasingly. clear no one would want which was a huge. problem they were they were facing a. catch 22 nobody was going to help them. unless they got national attention for. this but the more attention they got for. it the more it was the more they were. sticking themselves in this place until.

they got the help they needed because no. one was going to come along and buy your. house uh after a very short time when. word About Love Canal got out that's. right but guess who did buy their house. Jimmy Carter he did uh it finally does. become national news uh the national TV. networks were all over it uh they were. doing reports from there with all these. protests happening uh Jimmy Carter steps. in he declares a federal state of. emergency and say here's $10 million uh.

we can relocate we're going to buy up. your houses if you live uh within the. first like uh the first Zone basically. like that's closest to the canal Chuck. I'm I'm sorry I'm sorry on behalf of. everyone listening you're really not GNA. do a Jimmy Carter impression offering to. buy these people's houses oh boy I don't. I don't know if I've ever done Jimmy. Carter I did I was doing it when I was a. kid you have I've heard you have. I uh uh oh now I'm on the spot and I'm.

missing a tooth okay all. right maybe he can come in later this. will be the first time no it's not. happening that was good stuff uh it was. the first time that federal emergency. funds were used in the United States uh. in their history or our history uh for. something other than a natural disaster. so it was a big big deal uh that they. stepped in then along with the help of. New York State when Governor Carrie said. we're going to buy up 239 of these homes.

in the first couple of rings around this. landfill we're going to close that. school and also maybe don't eat those. veggies or the herbs you've been growing. in your backyard that was part of it and. also don't spend unnecessary time in. your basement that was the other thing. they said so all the teenage boys were. just like oh man so that's that's pretty. cool first the the first two rings so. people whose backyards um were on top of. essentially the um. the waist pit and then the people like.

maybe across the street from them the. the like all the way around the Love. Canal the US government was like we're. going to buy your houses you can move. now you're fine we're going to pay you. fair market value for them and the 239. people were like Yeah okay or 239. families but still it was awful I mean. imagine being like Oh I got to leave my. home now like sure someone's buying my. house but I didn't want to leave I I. work here that's definitely part of it. for sure. um there had to be like a pretty decent.

sense of relief though at least that was. happening like they weren't stuck. anymore but yeah I'm sure they didn't. want to leave their Community um or at. least some of them but the problem was. this you said that there was about 800. houses and a whole apartment building. that was in This Love Canal neighborhood. and the people who were there were like. okay uh you can't forget about us we we. need help too like in addition to um. like no one wanting to buy our houses.

because we're so close to the Love Canal. dump um we're still suffering all sorts. of Health maladies as well and so the. city goes back to their playbook and. they're like there's no way you guys are. actually suffering Health maladies. you're you're beyond the second ring of. houses you guys are fine you're just. hypochondriacs and the whole thing. started all over again and I think. luckily for all the people who lived in. Love Canal that were left out of the 800. um that the fact that Lois Gibbs was.

among them was definitely some a mark in. their favor for sure because she was. Unstoppable yeah she lived in that. second zone so she was still there so I. say we take a break and then we come. back and talk a little more about what. Lois did uh Lois Gibbs did and and who. she got some help from hint hint she. didn't. [Music]. quit.

[Music]. so Chuck now we reached the point where. Love Canal starts to really become. national news because um the the federal. government the St government the local. government they're like yep problem.

solved we moved the people who needed to. we we demolish their homes uh it's all. good essentially and this whole group. that was left behind that still needed. help were like no we're we're going to. get louder than ever essentially and a. division um grew in the community where. in Love Canal they were viewed outside. of the neighborhood in the rest of the. city as basically lab mouths Rabel. rousers people who were just out for. like easy money from the federal. government and were making up all these.

maladies um at the expense of the. tourism industry and ticking off hooker. they threatened the the well-being of. the rest of the town just by you know. being loud mouths and um it was a really. seems like it would have been a really. terrible time to live in Niagara Falls. oh I'm sure and Lois Gibbs is like you. know what I just bought a 100 bullhorns. that's right and they went no no no no. yeah she was like and I'm saving up for. the B.

batteries so uh the. lhca uh headed by Lois Gibbs brought in. Dr Beverly Pagan a scientist with the. health department of New York uh they. did their own. door-to-door uh detailed questionnaire. about People's Health they analyzed the. data they found um a lot of the same. problems but what they really zeroed in. on were the fact that if you lived in. what they called a wet home which was if. you Liv near a creek or Swale or. something uh versus a dry home that.

wasn't near Creek then you are much. worse off uh 20% of the children born in. wet homes had birth defects uh compared. to 6.8% in dry homes uh the asthma rate. was three and a half times higher in wet. homes suicide attempts were higher in. wet zones and this is when they were. dismissed uh I believe some of the. authorities said it was useless. housewife data yeah which is a real bum. in the eye of Lois Gibbs and the lhca.

and Dr Pagan yeah um just two things so. for reference um. 20% of children born in that area in the. wet homes that had congenital disorders. um compared to 6.8% both of those were. way above the national average for 1978. of. 2.8% so. almost a lot that was a lot more I was. going to do some math and I was like. don't do the math so I sto but the other.

um the other thing I wanted to just call. out was um Dr Pagan she was doing this. on her own time as a volunteer she was. volunteering her expertise as a cancer. researcher um to come up with the survey. to figure out like the actual data to. basically show that you didn't have to. be living right on top of the dump to. still be suffering health effects and. she very cleverly figured out that when. they built the homes for the Love Canal. neighborhood they covered up all sorts. of Old Creek beds old swales that were.

now underground but with the ground. being saturated they were providing. their old historic functions of moving. water through the neighborhood so a. plume of toxicity formed that wasn't. necessarily at the the the dump side any. longer it was moving out into these. areas that came to be known as wet homes. um and so she showed no these people are. really suffering as many effects some of. the people whose houses were on top of.

the dump and they still need help and. she risked her career doing that cuz she. was a New York State health inspector um. and she uh her organization had already. basically closed the book on it and she. was saying we need to open this back up. because we were wrong like it's worse. than we. thought right so after two more years. they uh finally get the EPA down there. and this is you know two full years of. of Contin continued protesting uh EPA. comes in they visit Love Canal they do.

their own blood test and chromosome test. and things like that and it showed that. there was you know what everyone else. had shown basically it wasn't useless. housewife data or. hypochondria and they got mad they got. so mad that they took a couple of EPA. officials. hostage um they said they're not going. to release them until we're relocated. cooler heads prevailed it only lasted. about 5 hours they didn't arrest anybody. mhm but it was it was a big deal brought. a lot more attention to it and uh in.

October of 1980 just a few days after. this hostage thing President Carter. steps in again and says all right here's. another $20 million New York is also. going to throw in 20 million doll and. we're going to relocate everybody uh 700. remaining homes uh everyone but two. families there's always a couple there. really is that are like no not leaving. uh they stayed there but everyone else. was relocated and Congress uh passed the.

comprehensive environmental response. compensation and liability act cira. terrible right not not great yeah that. was in 1980 uh they call it the super. fund law and that established a trust. fund with the EPA to clean up waste. sites in the future and establish a. national priorities list a super fund. list uh in 1983 that Love Canal was put. squarely on yeah and then a decade or so. later was used to clean up D David. hans's mom's potting shed yeah so um.

that super fun law it came out days. after uh no months after the hostage. standoff right and I was like okay. that's pretty quick that um you know. there surely this thing had been kicking. around Congress for a while and now. there was just an opportunity to push it. through apparently that's not true that. that law that created the super fund was. essentially created in response to Love. Canal and the protests that the love can. homeowners association were staging they.

created this this super fund like it. like people didn't understand that toxic. waste could pollute the ground before. this and now all of a sudden the F. federal government has a comprehensive. response plan designed within months. essentially that gives the EPA a right. to basically tax petroleum makers and. plastic makers and all that um and and. put it into this trust fund to help. clean up sites in the future amazing is. amazing it's it's you know federal. government at its finest it's not always.

great I will be the well probably not. the first to say it but I will say it. but uh this is an example of it doing. right yeah totally um so the the. remediation took a long time uh took a. couple of decades cost about 350 million. bucks they uh flattened all those homes. of course they did it they sealed the. landfill the correct way which is uh. with a 3-ft cap of clay um water imp. permeable plastic more top soil uh they.

started diverting the groundwater to uh. a facility that treats it uh they treat. about 5 million gallons of water a year. and they have about a 100 monitoring. Wells all over the site that collect. data uh you know at all times to detect. any uh chemical leakage that might be. happening um if you're wondering about. hooker chemical if they were on the hook. for any of this uh yes they eventually. were uh they were sued by the EPA. themselves and 7 9 uh they settled in. the 1990s and ended up uh between the.

federal government and New York State uh. repaying them about $227. million yeah which is kind did not have. to admit fault no no way um and so you. can make a kind of a an a a case that. they didn't need to admit fault you know. if you read enough about it I think that. means that insulates them from more. lawsuits sure no absolutely I don't. think it was just based on principles or. anything like that. yeah but that's kind of part for the. course with super fun stuff where uh the.

the the government says okay we're going. to pay for cleanup and then they go. after the people who were responsible. for the waste in the first place and. then sue them and then over the course. of a decade or two finally get some. fraction of the amount of the cleanup. costs yeah they front the cost. essentially essentially yeah so um Love. Canal neighborhood's still around today. uh they call it Black Creek and um the. the you said the houses in rings one and. two were demolished they were actually.

pushed into the pit or their the waste. was um and then covered over so the. houses are down there the parts of them. um and they rehabbed and updated the. houses that were left over and after the. EPA said okay we've cleaned this place. up enough um you guys can move back in. the neighborhood just got life breathed. back into it again and and weirdly just. like with as new people moved in uh in. the Love Canal neighborhood starting in. the 50s and 60s the not all of them were.

told that they were living on a toxic. waste stump and that that um a lot of. that information was lost for people the. same thing happened the second go around. there was a New York Times article that. found like there's people living there. that have no idea the history of this. place and that there's still a toxic. waste dump down there because that's. something worth pointing out Chuck they. didn't remove the toxic waste they just. covered it up better oh yeah than it was. covered up before yeah so there have. been lawsuits there have been um people. that still complain that move back into.

Black Creek of you know some of the same. issues there I think 20. lawsuits uh with 700 plaintiffs kind of. been recent years and just last year in. 2023 a state judge dismissed a couple of. the really big high-profile cases for. lack of evidence uh which you know. doesn't bode well for for lawsuits to. follow. obviously uh as far as you know testing. goes and whether or not there are really. like is still a real problem there um.

it's sort of conflicting evidence uh. inconclusive I guess uh mortality rate. is slightly elevated but within the. normal range uh cancer rates are. actually lower 6% lower uh but birth. defects are twice as high as other. communities nearby yeah and that sounds. really weird like why would cancer rates. be lower um apparently they're like the. sample size of this study is not huge so. we're not crazy about the results.

essentially um but yeah it I guess it. didn't turn out quite as bad as people. had thought which is good but I mean. tell that to the families who had babies. born with you know congenital disorders. and or died died young you know I mean. there's there was a lot of damage done. to people living there unfairly and. that's ultimately the the saddest Legacy. of it there's a triumphant Legacy to it. yeah but there's that that will never. that will never put a clay cap over the. tragedy that actually happened there too.

yeah well I hope there's a statue of. Lois Gibb somewhere I I don't know that. there is but she went on to for to found. the Center for Health environment and. Justice which she got so many letters uh. from her you know National high-profile. as a result of this that she went and. was like okay I'm going to start an. organization that helps small towns deal. with this um on their own with our help. I'm Lois skbs yeah she's like I can make. some real money off of.

this yeah she's she's so loaded she. wears floor length mink coats and shows. up in goldplated rolls to all these. these um neighborhood meetings no not my. low skbs I'm looking at pictures of now. out there shouting in in front of a. building I love it yep uh if you want to. know more about Love Canal or Lois Gibbs. or Beverly Pagan or anything like that. uh you can look all over the Internet. there's a bunch of great stuff to read. uh and since I said that it's time for.

listener. mail uh actually got one more thing so. pre- listener mail oh boy. okay uh it felt like the the perfect. episode to plug a friend's project one. of my oldest friends uh Dave Barnhart is. a documentary filmmaker who takes on. projects that you know need attention. like gun violence and things like that. and he did a documentary called Flint. the poisoning of an American city about. Flint Michigan of course and you should.

check it out it's h you go to Flint. poisoning. comom is the website for the. documentary and Dave is great he's doing. uh he's doing good work and he's a good. guy so um check out the trailer and see. where you can watch it great shout out. man I'm glad you did that um and I think. Flint deserves its own episode for sure. yeah we should follow up on that uh if. you uh already I already said that is it. time for listener mail yeah yeah I just. I just thed Jerry hit us with the.

[Music]. chime hey guys uh want to let you know. how much my family loves stuff you. should know my boys Evan and Alex and my. wife Rachel listen to every chance we. get uh it's the first thing we do in the. morning on the way to school the kids. want to see if there's a new episode and. they think you're the smartest people in. the world so imagine how they are. impressed when I their lowly dad found a. mistake oh in your in your snake oil. podcast nice uh you guys mentioned that. patent medicines are medicines protected. by patents which gives a manufacturer.

exclusive right without having to. disclose what's in it uh that's actually. the opposite uh patents Grant a limited. right to exclude others from making. using offering for sale or selling the. invention or importing it but in. exchange you have to disclose uh the. invention in a way that would enable one. skilled in the art to make or use the. invention uh in other words if a. medicine is patented you would have to. say exactly what's in it and and how you. made it otherwise you wouldn't get it. patent and you guys know this because.

you actually said that in your how IP. Works episode right y uh and that is. from David and you know what David I I. looked into that more and you're right. uh but I also found out. that 90% of these patent medicines. didn't even have patents they were just. called patent medicines all right so. that's from David. Greenfield thanks a lot David uh much. appreciated uh if you want to get in. touch with this like David did uh you. can just send an email to stuff podcast.

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