Eighty years ago, the Hanford Nuclear Site was activated as part of the Manhattan Project, a feat often celebrated for its revolutionary scientific advancements and its unprecedented collaboration between industry, the military, and a massive workforce. The goal: to develop the atomic bomb and change the course of global history.
Today, Hanford is the nation’s largest nuclear waste repository. It stands not only as a relic of wartime achievement, but as a symbol of the complex, and often hidden, costs of America’s atomic ambitions. This is not just history, but a legacy still unfolding, written into bodies, communities, and the land itself.
On Saturday, September 20, at 3pm at Central Library, we are honored to host Hanford’s Leaks, Legends, and Legacies, a powerful event that brings together four acclaimed author-activists and one expert moderator for an afternoon of stories, revelations, and remembrance.
Listen to the KYRS Thin Air Community Radio broadcast!
More Than a Panel
This program is one thread in a much larger, ongoing community conversation that continues to unfold across generations. A month-long exhibit of archival materials related to Hanford will be on display at Central Library, offering visitors a rare look into the documents, photographs, and histories that shaped, and sometimes obscured, public understanding of nuclear contamination in the Northwest.
Hanford produced the plutonium used in the atomic bomb dropped on Nagasaki. For decades afterward, it continued to operate in secrecy, even as radioactive materials leaked into the surrounding environment. The health and environmental consequences, often buried under layers of silence and bureaucracy, are still being uncovered.
Our panelists have spent decades bringing these truths to light. Moderated by Dr. Ann Le Bar, a historian and professor at Eastern Washington University, this discussion will examine the personal and regional impact of Hanford and emphasize the continuing urgency of environmental justice.
What will be shared during this event is not a distant tale, it’s our region’s story. It continues to shape lives, landscapes, and public trust in science and government.
Books by all panelists will be available for purchase, courtesy of Auntie’s Bookstore and Latah Books.
Meet the Panelists
- Trisha Pritikin is a lifelong advocate for atomic justice and a Hanford “downwinder” who grew up just miles from the site. Her acclaimed book, The Hanford Plaintiffs, documents the legal battles of those exposed to radiation, offering a deeply personal look at the human cost of nuclear development. Her new novel, Then Came the Summer Snow, explores similar themes through fiction.
- Kay Smith-Blum, a Seattle-based environmental advocate, turned her shock over Hanford’s leaking nuclear waste tanks into Tangles, a novel that brings urgency and humanity to the complex issue. A Companion short story appears in the 2024 anthology Feisty Deeds: Historical Fictions of Daring Women, which she also co-edited.
- Karen Dorn Steele is an award-winning investigative journalist and watershed hero whose groundbreaking reporting in the 1980s exposed secret radioactive releases at Hanford and their public health consequences. Her work brought national attention to the Hanford Downwinders and reshaped public understanding of government transparency and accountability.
- James Patrick Thomas is a nuclear peace activist and the author of Atomic Pilgrim, a memoir chronicling his 6,700-mile spiritual and political journey across the U.S. and nine other countries. For decades, he has investigated the human and environmental toll of nuclear weapons production, especially at Hanford, and helped uncover revelations about the site’s toxic impact.
