This episode of From The Archives to the Air presents highlights of KGNU’s coverage of historic demonstrations at the Rocky Flats Nuclear Weapons plant in the 1970s and 1980s.
The United States government operated the Rocky Flats plant, just outside of Boulder, from 1952 to 1994, although weapons manufacturing effectively ended in 1988. KGNU committed its resources to covering public opposition to that facility.
Anyone interested in an overview of the issues involved with the Rocky Flats plant would benefit from reading Kristen Iversen’s Full Body Burden. The author grew up in Arvada, and chronicles the history of the plant from a personal perspective.
A Reuters article, “How the U.S. government preserves pollution in conservation areas,” appeared July 20, 2022, and discusses Rocky Flats.
The Rocky Mountain Peace and Justice Center in Boulder has its origins in Rocky Flats demonstrations. Their website has an eight minute film (on its main page) documenting the 1983 Rocky Flats encirclement.
The Rocky Flats National Wildlife Refuge has a website.
It may not be the place of these notes to editorialize, but this writer would not visit the refuge. There is, however, information suggesting that the refuge is safe.
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Rocky Flats: From The Archives to the Air John Kelin
This episode of From The Archive to the Air was produced by John Kelin and Alexis Kenyon, with audio drawn from KGNU Archives.
CREDITS/NOTES
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From The Archives to the Air opening and closing music: Circus by Portron Portron Lopez is licensed under an attribution-noncommercial-share-alike license.
Outer East by Horse Lords is licensed under an Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0).
