2007 wasn't the only year that the Iowa River has had to deal with pollution.

Under the Cloud: the Decades of Nuclear Testing is a very disturbing book. I wasn't even 60 pages into this book before I read about the pollution in the Iowa River.

Back in September, 1945, a paper mill by Tama was making strawboard, using water from the Iowa River. The board was being made for Eastman-Kodak to hold film. Eastman-Kodak was puzzled by the imperfections - little pinhole dots and thin lines - on the film stored in these boxes. After some testing, it was discovered that there was radioactivity in the water used by the mill. The wind currents carried the residue from a Nevada nuclear testing that occurred a few months before. Iowa was in the path of the fallout.

And that wasn't the only time Iowa has had fallout from nuclear testing.

When I was growing up in the '60s and '70s, I learned that nuclear testing was done in Nevada. That seemed so far away. I would have never guessed that there could be problems 1,500 miles away from the test site.

Richard Miller gives a detailed history of nuclear testing beginning in the 1930s. In the back of the book are U.S. maps showing the fallout from nuclear testings done from 1951 to 1963. On the book jacket, there is a map showing all areas of the continental United States crossed by more than one nuclear cloud from above ground detonations. It's scary. This map on the jacket looks like someone shot off the lower section of Nevada and heavily stained the rest of the U.S. with thick, black blood.

Back in the 1950s, people used to plan trips to see the atomic bombs exploding, watching the mushroom cloud form overhead. To help the tourists, The Atomic Energy Commission actually released schedules about their detonations. This was after the bombing of Japan during World War II!

Under the Cloud is a well-researched book about the destruction and pollution mankind has caused from nuclear detonations. If you look at the reviews on Amazon.com, you'll see that I'm not alone in recommending this book.

Under the Cloud is on the second floor under the call number 363.179 MIL.

c Waterloo Public Library 2007