IN CALIFORNIA

Increase in radiation ‘alarmins

By STEVE MURDOCK and
MARGERY CANRIGHT

SAN FRANCISCO The
spring rains that raised again
the ancient spectre of flood in
California contained a new in-
gredient this year — radioac-
tivity.

“Now that your family is
radioactive...” began a
leaflet distributed Easter Sun-
day before the gates heading
to the laboratory where they
first smashed the atom.

“Rain, rain, go away. Come
again without gamma rays,”

said one of the signs carried by
250 persons who marched
through downtown Berkley,
demonstrated before the gates
to the University of Califor-
nia’s radiation laboratories and
then walked in the pouring
rain before the Atomic Energy
Commission’s offices in neigh-
boring Oakland.

The local nature of ‘the fall-
out imparted a sense of ur-
gency to this regional facet of
a world-wide Easter week-
end protest against the further
testing of nuclear weapons.

Thus did the San Francisco

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FOURTEEN OTHER PRIZES .

Chronicle take editorial note
on Tuesday of this week of the
fact, “We are presently eating,
in California, radioactively
contaminated leafy veget
tables.” The danger from eat-
ing such vegetables is, the
paper ‘observed, a matter of
debate. But. however small the
risk, The Chronicle felt it
should be shared.

“We who about to munch

- would be happier in know-
ing that Atomic Energy Com-
missioners, Senators, Repre-
sentatives and others in the
decision-making echelon, were
ingesting gamma rays, too, as
a part of their daily diet dose
of radiation.”

The grim humor of those
words was repeated in some

of the signs carried by the:

Easter Sunday demonstrators
(“No Contamination Without
Representation”), but beneath
the irony was an anger made
more urgent by the public dis-
closure of these facts:

@ Radioactive rain-that fell
on Northern California. the
evening of March 26, and
through the following week-
end contained at times radio-
active fall out in more than
200 times the “safe drinking
water standard” of the AEC.
Source for this fact is the
California State Department
of Public Health, with head-
quarters in Berkeley:

® Scientists at the Univer-
sity of California’s Donner Ra-

-diation Laboratory discovered

that wheh they wiped the tops

IN JAPAN

By ANNA FUJIKAWA
TOKIO—While Prime Min-

ister Nobosuke Nishi has
grudgingly welcomed the
Soviet Union’s decision to

stop testing nuclear weapons,
leaders of Japanese organiza-
tions and public opinion have
enthusiastically hailed the
Soviet move.

For instance, the three pa-
pers with the largest circula-
tion followed their welcoming
statements with pleas for the
United States and Britain to
follow the Soviet example.

Asahi Shimbun, Japan’s
léading paper, welcomed the
Soviet action, but deplored
Moscow’s statement that the
USSR will resume tests unless
the West follow it example..
The next day Aoahi appealed
for a stop to tests by Britain
and the United States.

Mainichi Shimbun, Asahi’s

aye

of their cars with tissue they
wiped up 20,000 counts of ra-
dioactivity per minute per

square foot. Under laboratory

regulations the tissue had to

be thrown in “radioactive
waste” cans rather than in
garbage.

© Boards that had been ie
ing in the rain or tarpaper
from roofs had up to 60,000
counts per minute per square
foot of beta and gamma_ ac-
tivity This fallout, says the
Emergency Bay Area Fallout
Committee, which distributed
a leaflet here, “ . . . was as
heavy as some of the worst
fallouts that hit Japan during
the past few years? __

® The California State De-
partment of Public Health re-
vealed its fallout monitoring
activities have been curtailed
almost to the vanishing point
by economies of the state Leg-
islature.

Most of the monitoring has
actually been done by person-
nel from Donner lab, who vol-
unteered for the job when the
state department failed to get
needed money.

@ Milk sampling for dread
Strontium 90, a radioactive el-
ement that causes bone and
blood cancer, is done by the
U.S. Department. of_ Public
Health, but testing is done in
the East and reports are not
returned for six months No
current reports are available
to the public on the Strontium
90 content in California milk.

John Maga, sanitation chief .

leading competitor, declared:
“If the United States sshould
think lightly of the Soviet
move and force its Pacific
tests for military gains, world
opinion will certainly turn on
the U.S... . If both sides later
enter into a formal conference
to suspend such tests perma-
nently after having stopped
their own tests, the issue of
banning all such tests will
make rapid progress.” —

Yomiuri Shimbun declared
that the reason so far given
by the U.S. for its failure to
suspend them unless the
Soviet Union stopped — is
now groundless.

Among expressions of mass
opinion, that of the Japan

Students Anti-War Union, was ~

most dramatic. On the morn-
ing of the Soviet announce-
ment, 45 students’ held a dem-
onstration within the grounds

~

Soviet H-test ban wekoriall

April 18, 1958 — PACIFIC TRIBUNE—F4

for the state health _
ment, said contaminst
due to both recent
and earlier America

Dr. Robert Dyar of thes
department explaine® “gout
that California gets # rat?
dose of fallout due to sei 4
spheric retention and
ination of the lowel- ‘er |
the atmosphere due
testing.

These facts produces |
variety of activity, ing
the following:

ol

® On Good rasan *
mobilized by the fot
California Committee
Abolition of Nucleat
staged a demonstration jg
the California Radiatio
oratory in Livermore igi
of the demonstrators: gi)!
ing three young womeD gg
ed 21 miles from TrEey
Altamont Pass, campy
the rainy night under 4 —
way overpass.

® State Assembly
Mulford promised to P
a $87,433 emergency ape
ation in the Califor
lature to pay for ™ ro
of. radioactive fallout
state health depart”

© State Assemblym™ ne
O'Connell still has pens | i
fore the legislature a fot
tion = GHR- 15)” calling taf
moratorium’ on all 1°"
nuclear weapons. THE
tion is still before *h®
Committee where it #
oned by a 3 to 3 vote.

of the U.S. embassy #04
mitted three demands
embassy officials.

They urged the US:
low the Soviet example
diately, to put off
nounced hydrogen bo™
at Eniwetok, and to fic
oppression of democt4
ganizations in OkinaW™ ni

Heichi Fuji, a repia
of the Hiroshima Victim
ganizations, declared:
ica should halt first
they were the first 7
use the bomb. We victt
greatly encouraged
Soviet move.’ vet

Dr. Sakata, a mem.
the Japan Council of “4
tists, said: “Further ?
tests will do more
harm to mankind. This
move will not only giv®
joy to the Japanese—
but to all humanity.” —