Love Canal

and the Birth of the Environmental Health Movement

Lois Marie Gibbs

• Publisher: Island Press
• Year: 2011
• ISBN:
  9781610910309
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: World History
• Index: History

Today, "Love Canal" is synonymous with the struggle for environmental health and justice. But in 1972, when Lois Gibbs moved there with her husband and new baby, it was simply a modest neighborhood in Niagara Falls, New York. How did this community become the poster child for toxic disasters? How did Gibbs and her neighbors start a national movement that continues to this day? What do their efforts teach us about current environmental health threats and how to prevent them? Love Canal is Gibbs' original account of the landmark case, now updated with insights gained over three decades.

1

The Problem at Love Canal

Almost everyone has heard about Love Canal, but not many people know what it is all about. The Love Canal story is about a thousand families who lived near the site of an abandoned toxic chemical waste dump. More important, it is a warning of what could happen in any American community. We have very little protection against the toxic chemical wastes that threaten to poison our water, our air, and our food. The federal and state governments have agreed to move away everyone who wants to move—but they didn't at first. We had to work to achieve that goal. Love Canal is the story of how government tends to approach a problem, and of how we, ordinary citizens of the United States, can take control of our own lives by insisting that we be heard.

I want to tell you our story—my story—because I believe that ordinary citizens—using the tools of dignity, self-respect, common sense, and perseverance—can influence solutions to important problems in our society. To a great extent, we won our fight. It wasn't easy, that's for sure. In solving any difficult problem, you have to be prepared to fight long and hard, sometimes at great personal cost, but it can be done. It must be done if we are to survive as a democratic society—indeed, if we are to survive at all.

In order to understand what happened at Love Canal, and to understand my part in it, you need to know more about the canal. The best way to introduce you to the canal and its story is, I think, to let you read the statement we wrote in June 1980, explaining ourselves to the thousands of people from all over the world who wrote expressing interest and offering their support and help. You will see that we financed our fight against the federal government and the state of New York with donations from individuals and with the proceeds from T-shirt and cookie-bake sales. You don't need money, but it helps; what you need most are determination, imagination, the conviction that you're right, and the knowledge that you are fighting not only for your family but also for the good of everyone.

The Love Canal story—its history, effects, impact on human lives, and our struggle for a remedy—is best summarized by the Love Canal Homeowners Association statement:

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LOVE CANAL HOMEOWNERS ASSOCIATION

WHO ARE WE?

We are residents and taxpayers of New York State, living in a small middle-class community. We are a group of concerned citizens and environmentalists, worried about the effects of toxic wastes in our area, and across the country. Love Canal families have seen first hand what low-level chemical exposure can do to our health and the environment, and want to help other people clean up or avoid problems in their neighborhoods.

The Love Canal Homeowners Association, Inc., was formed in August 1978 and our membership consists of over 500 families. The Homeowners Association has been successful in getting action in their area, including the funds to allow all residents to evacuate the Love Canal area and move to a safe environment. Our new goal is to educate and assist other communities with their problems or others interested in the hazardous-waste issue.

WHAT IS THE LOVE CANAL?

The Love Canal is a hazardous-waste dump site located in the center of a middle-class community in Niagara Falls, New York. We are the first dump site to be recognized, of the thousands of dumps across the nation. The Environmental Protection Agency has recently estimated there are about 30,000 to 50,000 toxic-waste dumps across the United States.

THE HISTORY OF LOVE CANAL

In 1892, William T. Love (where the name Love Canal originated) proposed connecting the upper and lower Niagara River, by digging a canal six to seven miles long, so he could harness the water of the upper Niagara River into a navigable channel which would create a man-made waterfall with a 280-foot drop into the lower Niagara River, and thereby provide cheap power. However, the country fell into an economic depression and financial backing for the project slipped away. Love then abandoned the project, leaving behind a partially-dug section of the canal. In 1920, the land was sold at public auction and became a municipal and chemical disposal site until 1953. The principal company that dumped their waste in the canal was Hooker Chemical Corporation, a subsidiary to Occidental Petroleum Corporation. The City of Niagara Falls and the United States Army used the site as well, with the city dumping garbage and the army dumping possible chemical warfare material and parts of the Manhattan project.

In 1953, Hooker Chemical Corporation, after filling the canal and covering it with dirt, sold the land to the Niagara Falls Board of Education for $1.00. The deed contained a stipulation which said that if anyone incurred physical harm or death because of their buried wastes, Hooker would not be responsible. Hooker continually tells us they properly warned the city and the board. We wonder.

Soon after the land changed owners, home building began adjacent to the 16-acre rectangle which was once the canal. Families purchasing the homes were unaware of Love Canal. In 1955, an elementary school was opened; it had been erected near the corner of the canal. Residents began to complain about children being burnt, nauseous odors, and black sludge in the later 1950s, but nothing was done. It was not until the later 1970s that government finally decided to investigate the complaints.

The state began to investigate the health and environmental problems in the spring of 1978. Since then we have had three major evacuations, including two emergency declarations by President Carter.

WHAT DOES THE LOVE CANAL CONTAIN AND HOW FAR HAS IT GONE?

There are over 200 different compounds that have been identified so far, in and around the canal. There are at least 12 known carcinogens (cancer-causing chemicals), some human, others animal. Benzene is one which is well-known for causing leukemia in people. Dioxin, the most deadly of all chemicals, has also been found in and around the Love Canal. Our health commissioner characterized dioxin as “the most toxic substance ever synthesized by man.” Dioxin is toxic in very minute amounts and is found as a contaminant in trichlorophenol, of which there were over 200 tons buried in the canal.

Hooker admits to burying about 21,800 tons of various chemicals in the canal, but this is all they will admit to. The U.S. Army denies burying wastes, yet there are residents who testified to seeing army personnel and trucks on-site.

The extent of chemical migration is still in question. Many of the air, soil, and water tests have found chemicals throughout a ten-block residential area, in our creeks and the Niagara River. We do not know if all chemicals found were from Love Canal or another dump, or even if further tests would find problems eleven, twelve, or thirteen blocks away.

WHAT ARE THE HEALTH EFFECTS?

After the first state health department studies were completed, a health order was issued. On August 2.1978, the New York State Department of Health recommended temporary relocation of ALL pregnant women and children under the age of two. This order was issued because of a high incidence of miscarriages and birth-defected children in the 239 families they studied. These families lived closest to the canal. By August 9, 1978, Governor Carey permanently relocated these families, purchasing their homes at replacement value.

On February 8, 1979, another evacuation order was issued for pregnant women and children under two in the outer neighborhood, again because of miscarriages, stillbirths, birth defects, and low birth-weight babies.

On May 21, 1980, President Carter declared a health emergency because of an Environmental Protection Agency health study which showed an abnormal amount of chromosome breakage in the Love Canal residents. (Chromosome breakage means an increased chance of getting cancer or of having a miscarriage, a birth-defected baby, or genetic damage in your family.) This order allowed 810 families temporary relocation out of the neighborhood.

On October 1, 1980, President Carter signed a bill to evacuate ALL families permanently from Love Canal, not because of adverse pregnancies, chromosome damage, or high chemical exposures, but because of mental anguish.

Our association, with the help of other scientists, conducted a health survey of our community. We were forced to do our own study because the governmental agencies would not conduct a good objective scientific study. We looked at the area as a whole, and found that families who lived on underground stream beds had the highest incidence of disease, but also that many families in the area were affected with an abnormally high rate of illnesses.

The results of our studies showed above-normal amounts of miscarriages (50-70 percent chance) while living in Love Canal; the birth-defect rate in the preceding five years to be 56 percent; an increase in central nervous system disease including epilepsy, nervous breakdowns, suicide attempts, and hyperactivity in children; a greater chance of contracting urinary disorders including kidney and bladder problems; an increase in asthma and other respiratory problems.

Our most recent survey showed that out of the last 15 pregnancies in Love Canal women, we have had only two normal births. The rest resulted in a miscarriage, and stillborn or birth-defected babies.

CONTAINMENT

The remedial construction around the canal is designed to prevent water from soaking into the canal and to halt the outward flow of chemicals into the community. The drainage system consists of eight-inch perforated clay pipes, laid 12 to 15 feet deep, encircling the canal to intercept water. The contaminated water then flows into a steel holding tank and is treated on-site by an activated charcoal system. The system was then covered with a clay cap about six feet deep. Top soil and grass was planted on the cap to finish the project.

There are many problems with this system.

(1) At best, it will contain wastes in the canal; it will not remove them.

(2) It will not remove or address any chemical wastes that have moved out into the ten-block area or through the storm sewer system.

(3) There are no monitoring wells placed; therefore no one can tell us if it is even working.

(4) Will the clay crack, as it has done in the past, only to cause further contamination of our environment and threaten public health?

HAS GOVERNMENT LEARNED FROM LOVE CANAL?

No. The new federal regulations, Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA), allow new Love Canals to be built legally, maybe in your back yard. The only difference is that the new landfills must be monitored, but not by a responsible agency. The owner of the dump, the guy who is making millions, will be the watchdog; he is supposed to report any problems.

Government (specifically, the Environmental Protection Agency) refuses to use its authority to force industry to properly dispose of their wastes to protect our health and environment. Why? Because industry has power and money.

There are safe methods now which could be used to dispose of 80 percent of the wastes, through recycling, neutralizing, or high-temperature incineration. These processes have been proven to work in countries in Europe. We can use safe methods here if you, the taxpayer, voter, citizen, force the government to use their authority! YOU have to help put a stop to the industrial poisoning of America! Write your representative, join an environmental group in your area, or contact us. Together we can fight pollution; alone we will all suffer from it!

WHAT WILL NOW HAPPEN TO THE LOVE CANAL NEIGHBORHOOD

The state and local governments would like to revitalize the neighborhood after we leave. They are planning to resell our homes. Why? Because no one will admit there is a health problem at Love Canal. They will only acknowledge a concern for pregnant women and children under two. The health studies have all been whitewashed. We are trying to stop the revitalization program, but if we don't succeed, the nation will hear new cries for help from Love Canal in a few years. When will they ever learn?!

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Before Love Canal

If you drove down my street before Love Canal (that's what I call what happened to us), you might have thought it looked like a typical American small town that you would see in a TV movie—neat bungalows, many painted white, with neatly clipped hedges or freshly painted fences. The houses are generally small but comfortable; at that time (“before Love Canal” in 1978) they sold for about $30,000. If you came in the summer time, you would have seen men painting their houses or adding an extra room, women taking care of gardens, and children riding bicycles and tricycles on the sidewalks or playing in the back yards.

You would see something quite different today. Since Love Canal, the houses nearest the canal area have been boarded up and abandoned. Many have homemade signs and graffiti, vividly telling what happened to make this a ghost town. The once-neat gardens are overgrown, the lawns uncut. A high chain-link fence surrounds the houses nearest the canal. The area is deserted. The fence is a reminder of the 22,000 tons of poisons buried there, poisons that cause cancer, that can cause mothers to miscarry or give birth to deformed children, poisons that can make children and adults sick, many of them in ways doctors only dimly understand.

When we moved into our house on 101st Street in 1972, I didn't even know Love Canal was there. It was a lovely neighborhood in a quiet residential area, with lots of trees and lots of children outside playing. It seemed just the place for our family. We have two children: Michael, who was born just before we moved in, and Melissa (Missy), born June 12, 1975. I was twenty-six. I liked the neighborhood because it was in the city, but out of it. It was convenient. There was a school within walking distance. I liked the idea of my children being able to walk to the 99th Street School. The school's playground was part of a big, open field with houses all around. Our new neighbors told us that the developers who sold them their houses said the city was going to put a park on the field.

It is really something, if you stop and think of it, that underneath that field were poisons, and on top of it was a grade school and a playground. We later found out that the Niagara Falls School Board knew the filled-in canal was a toxic dump site. We also know that they knew it was dangerous because, when the Hooker Chemical Corporation sold it to them for one dollar, Hooker put a clause in the deed declaring that the corporation would not be responsible for any harm that came to anyone from chemicals buried there. That one-dollar school site turned out to be some bargain!

My Son Attending That School

Love Canal actually began for me in lune 1978 with Mike Brown's articles in the Niagara Falls Gazette. At first, I didn't realize where the canal was. Niagara Falls has two sets of streets numbered the same. Brown's articles said Love Canal was between 99th and 97th Streets, but I didn't think he meant the place where my children went to school or where I took them to play on the jungle gyms and swings. Although I read the articles, I didn't pay much attention to them. One article did stand out, though. In it, Mike Brown wrote about monkeys subjected to PCBs having miscarriages and deformed offspring,

One of his later articles pointed out that the school had been built over the canal. Still, I paid little attention: it didn't affect me, Lois Gibbs. I thought it was terrible, but I lived on the other side of Pine Avenue. Those poor people over there on the other side were the ones who had to worry. The problem didn't affect me, so I wasn't going to bother doing anything about it, and I certainly wasn't going to speak out about it. Then when I found out the 99th Street School was indeed on top of it, I was alarmed. My son attended that school. He was in kindergarten that year. I decided I needed to do some investigating.

I went to my brother-in-law, Wayne Hadley, a biologist and, at the time, a professor at the State University of New York at Buffalo. He had worked on environmental problems and knew a lot about chemicals. I asked him to translate some of that jibber-jabber in the articles into English. I showed Wayne Mike Brown's articles listing the chemicals in the canal and asked what they were. I was really alarmed by his answer. Some of the chemicals, he said, can affect the nervous system. Just a little bit, even the amount that's in paint or gasoline, can kill brain cells. I still couldn't believe it, but if it were true, I wanted to get Michael out of that 99th Street School.

I went down to the offices of the Gazette and was surprised to learn how many articles there were on Love Canal. It not only surprised me, it panicked me! The articles listed the chemicals and described some reactions to them. One is damage to the central nervous system. Michael had begun having seizures after he started school. Another is leukemia and other blood diseases. Michael's white blood cell count had gone down. The doctor had said that might have been caused by the medication he took for his epilepsy, but now I wasn't so sure. Michael had started school in September and had developed epilepsy in December; in February, his white blood count dropped.

All of a sudden, everything seemed to fall into place. There's no history of epilepsy in either my family or my husband's. So why should Michael develop it? He had always been sensitive to medication. I could never give him an aspirin like a normal baby because he would get sick to his stomach or break out in a rash. I couldn't give him anything because of that sensitivity. If it were true that Michael was more sensitive than most other children, then whatever chemicals were buried under the school would affect him more than they did other children in the school, or even more than my daughter Missy who has always been a strong, lively child. The chemicals probably would not affect Missy, at least not right away. I wasn't thinking then about long-term effects. (A year and a half later, Missy was hospitalized for a blood-platelet disorder, but later she was fine.)

I went over all the articles with Wayne and decided Michael definitely should not attend that school—nor, for that matter, should any child. They shouldn't even play on that playground. Wayne was worried about his son Eric: he and my sister Kathy used to leave Eric for me to baby-sit while they were at work. I was stunned that the school board had allowed a school to be built on such a location. Even today, it doesn't seem possible that, knowing there were dangerous chemicals buried there, someone could put up a school on that site. The 99th Street School had over 400 children that year, one of its lowest annual enrollments.

I was about to get my first lesson in dealing with officials. When I started, I was interested only in myself and my child. I didn't stop to think about the other children in the neighborhood. I considered sending Michael to a Catholic school, and I even looked into the possibility; but I'm not Catholic, and my husband Harry didn't approve of a strict religious education. Besides, there were plenty of other schools in Niagara Falls. We had a choice. My choice was to send Michael to another public school.

I called the superintendent of sc...