By Robin Chapple

In June I was given a unique opportunity to attend the IEN Protecting Mother Earth conference at the Sacred Youth Camp, near the communities of Laguna and Acoma Pueblos, in New Mexico. I had been invited to attend a People’s Gold Conference in California by Project Underground. Whilst there, the organisers discovered my role within the anti-uranium movement and offered to fund the extension of my trip to IEN.

The conference, lasting four days, was held in the foothills of Mount Taylor, one of the four Navajo’s Dine Sacred Mountains, at a height of 8000 feet. All facilities were trucked in to the location by the Dine Citizens Against Ruining our Environment (Dine CARE) who were the hosts of the conference, ‘Lle tsoo (Uraninite) Ten Years of Indigenous Grassroots Organising - A Return to the Southwest.’ At the height of participation they were catering for about a thousand people.

The participants came from South America, Mexico, Australia, Philippines and Alaska. The Shoshone, Lakota, Pueblo, Navajo, Hualapai and many other Indian nations were represented. The conference focused on Uranium/Nuclear issues and was centred around establishing support for the Dine people’s fight against uranium mining at Crownpoint and Church Rock. I had the sorrow to meet many Indian people who had suffered at the hands of multinational uranium mining companies and the privilege to mingle with people who, even though many were extremely sick, were still prepared to fight to protect ‘Mother Earth’.

Death
Camped on Mount Taylor we were almost immediately above the Jackpile Uranium Mine so it is appropriate that I first relate the story of Dorothy Purley and the Laguna Pueblo people. It is a story of exploited trust and of corporate greed. But, most of all it is the story of death, the death of the beautiful and sacred places and Indian peoples of America. “What I am now is a bag of bones standing before you,” said Dorothy Purley, Laguna Pueblo, a cancer victim - fighting for her life. For 10 years, Purley drove a truck and worked as an ore crusher at the Jackpile Mine in Laguna Pueblo. She miscarried three children. Her brother has cancer and other family members are victims of leukemia or are diabetics on dialysis.

“There are so many people who have died, most of the people I worked with at the mine are gone. There are children who never knew their fathers.” Unable to halt her flow of tears, Purley said, “Look at me. Some of my friends don’t even recognise me. But I thank the Good Lord and Mother Earth who is helping me stand on her.” Manuel Pino an Acoma Pueblo and professor at Scottsdale (Ariz.) Community College, said Acomas people also worked at the neighbouring mine in Laguna Pueblo.

Pino said that at the height of the Cold War, the Grants mineral belt was a nuclear arsenal and today, the United States has enough nuclear power to blow up the world several times over. “Uranium mining has desecrated not only our Earth, but our traditional cultural lifestyles. It has desecrated the lives of our Navajo - Dine - and Acoma and Laguna people.”

Pino knows that the people are dying of cancers - leukemia, bone cancer and others. And the struggle to educate tribal leaders has been difficult. “It is frustrating when your tribal leaders tell you to go get an education and come back. Then when we do that and point out the dangers of uranium mining, we get the doors slammed directly in our faces.” Pino, who joins Purley in the Laguna-Acoma Coalition for a Safe Environment, said Indian leaders have been co-opted in mining and nuclear destruction with the promise of money, jobs and development.”But when people die of cancer, they take none of that with them,” he said

Jackpile miner John G. Hampton an Acoma Pueblo, was a surface labourer and station tender in Laguna’s underground mine. At 53, he was diagnosed with bone marrow cancer and given a short time to live. All of the speakers were concerned that mining companies were seducing their elders with promises of money and jobs, whilst failing to warn them of the resultant illness and death associated with working in the uranium industry.

Hampton has survived to 64 and says tribal leaders are not listening. Instead, they are seeking their own advantage. “We are at their mercy. We are at their disposal”, Hampton said.
Larry Lente of Paguate village in Laguna Pueblo said while radioactive dust fell on his village, the people were maintaining traditional lifestyles. While they dried meat and vegetables in the sun, they consumed the radioactive dust that fell on their food. Referring to the leases signed by tribes with promises of jobs and money, Lente said, “The almighty green dollar commands what we do.” Urging reform of US federal law, Pino said everyone who worked in the uranium and nuclear industry should be compensated, and not just those who fall into the narrow definitions of the federal US Radiation Exposure Compensation Act.

“If you were exposed, you were exposed,” Pino said.

I also heard the unforgettable story of the Dene people, (a similar sounding name to the Dine) of the North West Territories of Canada, who must be considered to be the first victims of the atomic bomb. All but a handful of these people have died. These people were employed as the workers at the mine that provided ore to the atomic bomb program that detonated over 1000 nuclear weapons on the Western Shoshone Nevada test site.

The Dene ore carriers of Deline in the Northwest Territories, carried what was called the money rock that became the death rock - uranium ore for the first atomic bomb.

The Dene people of the Northwest Territories fished and hunted caribou before the money rock was found at their Great Bear Lake. Long ago, the Dene had a prophet among them who received a vision. “Under this rock is a matter so powerful no man can survive it,” he told the people.

Describing the vision, he said, “This material was put into a big stick on to what looked like a metal bird. It was dropped on people that looked just like us and burned them all” This prophecy began unfolding in the 1930s, when a Dene man named Beyonnie found the black rock east of Great Bear Lake. Beyonnie gave the rock to a white trapper, who rewarded him with bags of flour, baking powder and lard.

Soon after, the Canadian Crown established the Eldorado Mine at the site. As it dredged for uranium ore, it dumped uranium waste rock and tailings into the lake where the Dene fished and caribou migrated. “They hired all able-bodied Dene men to carry the ore in gunnysacks on their backs to the barges for $5 a day”, Cindy Kinney-Gilday, daughter of a Dene ore carrier, said.
But, it was not just the men who came into contact with the radioactive dust. “This is a tribe that takes the family wherever they go. “In the 1970s, the men began to die of all kinds of cancers. It was the first time the people of Great Bear Lake ever heard of cancer,” Cindy said. It was not until decades later - when the men who carried 100-pound ore bags on their backs began dying of cancer - that they realised that the money rock was a death rock.
“Deline is now a village of widows,” said Cindy.

The Dene appealed to the Canadian government and submitted a formal resolution, but there was no response. While researching the government role, Dene uncovered documents revealing that the Canadian Ministry of Health knew of the risks and failed to inform Native labourers. Cindy returned to her village of Deline to help the widows tell their story. “The story of the ore carriers was never told until two years ago. Now, there are only five survivors.”
Cindy who has since been carrying out research in Ottawa, into the development of the mining process has found a great deal of the evidence has been destroyed. “A lot of documentation was shredded.”

The Dene of Great Bear Lake were never told that they were transporting a secret weapon - uranium - which the United States would use to produce the first atomic bomb.
Canada has confirmed that uranium from Eldorado was used to make the world’s first atomic bombs, dropped by warplanes of the United States on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945. Declassified documents in the United States reveal that both the buyer, the United States government, and Ottawa, then the world’s largest supplier, withheld information from Native miners that could have saved their health and their lives.

They died of cancers of the lung, kidney, stomach and colon.

“Dene in the village no longer have grandfathers to pass down the spiritual practices, nor uncles to slap the wrists of the young when they do something wrong,” Cindy said. And it is not just the story of the Dene of Deline, but the story of all indigenous people who worked along the Saskatchewan transportation route. When asked how many ore carriers have died?, she replies by saying 'The only way to tell is by counting the graves.'

Still Fighting
Whilst hearing the above histories I was concerned to hear that the Indian nations were still having to fight against nuclear madness.

The Eastern Navajo Dine are combating the development of the Crownpoint Uranium Project (CUP) on their land. This involves three ISL mines on their land, identified as Church Rock, Unit One and Crownpoint. These mines would produce 2-3 million pounds of uranium per annum. The Dine have achieved status in a legal action by demonstrating that they are local residents whose health and safety will be adversely affected by uranium ISL mining.

The Western Shoshone are fighting against the imposition of the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste dump on their lands. This site is located within the Nevada Nuclear Test Site. $1.7 US billion has already been spent studying this site, with little result. 32 earthquakes faults criss-cross the site and irradiated water from the surrounding 1000+ nuclear detonations has been found in the base of the site, ruining the theory that the aquifer is geologically isolated.

Success
Wally Antone, a Quechen from Arizona, recalled the occupation and eventual success at Ward Valley. Resistance had been mounted by the Quechen people to a proposed nuclear dump on sacred land. A sacred fire had burned at the site through some of the most inhospitable weather the region had ever experienced. The fire never extinguished had burned for 113 days. “We had respect for that fire,” Antone said. At the Ward Valley camp, there were Bird Songs to the Creator for protection. Non-native environmentalists helped maintain the difficult occupation in the Mojave Desert’s 125-degree temperatures without a local source of water.

Antone said, “I am happy to be a member of the Rainbow Coalition - that means we are all members of the human family. At Ward Valley, we lived like one big family.”

I was deeply moved by the people I met. Two such people I must mention at this time; Corbin Harney, an immensely spiritual man and Carrie Dann who has fought for Western Shoshone sovereignty. The conference also enabled me to establish many beneficial contacts with international visionaries. For this I extend my thanks for this marvellous experience to Project Underground of San Francisco.

See the Shoshone’s wonderful Shundahai Network website that covers many of these issues. It’s at http://www.shundahai.org