TMI 35 years later
"I grew up here, [at] the address I’m living at now. I moved when I was 2 years old, and I’ve been there all my life. I went to a small school about a mile from me. Very tight-knit. From there I went to Bishop McDevitt, and then graduated. For a number of years, I worked for higher education and for a bank. Then I met my husband, and we got married in 1968. We’ve been married 46 years this year. Still going strong. We have five children, 16 grandchildren. I still [work] daycare. This year is going to be my last year for daycare, and I’ve done it for 42 years."
"I was absolutely oblivious to [TMI]. I heard something about there might be a nuclear power plant coming in. I’m thinking ‘That sounds kind of dangerous.’ But the government was supervising it, and it would basically be okay. That’s about all I was interested in at that time. The only thing we learned about nuclear is that there [were] bomb testings that went on in Nevada, and that Atoms for Peace. Also, a cold war was raging, so we had to be prepared against mother Russia. It seems ironic how things have so come full circle in many respects like that."
"Many of the men that I dealt with at the company – a lot of those men put their lives on the line when they went in there to lift the head off the plant when the accident first occurred. So I have a deep abiding respect. There were many of those men that the company cared no more about than they did us. I’ve always tried to keep that in perspective, not to demonize the people that I’m opposed to."
"I went to the first NRC meeting they had over in Hershey and I saw how dismissive they are of our feelings, of our concerns. I had one NRC gentleman tells me to go home and bake cookies and he’ll take care of everything. I said ‘If you were taking care of everything, we would not have had this accident, would we?’ He didn’t know what to say to that. It was those kind of dismissive things that kind of spurred me on, too. I did come from the ‘60s to a certain extent. How can you dismiss me because I’m a woman? My concerns are just as great as that man who’s sitting down the street or that man who’s working in the company. "
“Well, I had only been there for 5 weeks. I’d just gotten the job [and] moved here. No one was ordering me to cover [TMI]. For the first night I went down, I went down to see it— I had a friend and I asked him to drive me down. There were people in moon suits taking radiation readings the first night.”
"People underestimate their genuine power as a person, as a parent, as a student, as a consumer. I bet if you’re yelling, there are about 50,000 other people that feel the same way as you do. I learned that at the first meeting. I was one of the last to speak. I got up and said: “To my knowledge, I don’t know another person in this room except the person that I came with, but I can tell you now that I’m tired of being dismissed. I’m tired of you people playing dumb games when you should be finding out what the problem is and solving it. Until you do that, I’m not interested in anything you have to say.’ Everybody in that room stood up and cheered. I thought ‘That’s it. That’s really where everybody is coming from.’"
“Well, I had only been there for 5 weeks. I’d just gotten the job [and] moved here. No one was ordering me to cover [TMI]. For the first night I went down, I went down to see it— I had a friend and I asked him to drive me down. There were people in moon suits taking radiation readings the first night.”
"[I] called a realtor to come and look at the home. I couldn't just sell it and walk away. We were also worried financially – were we going to take a hit because of what happened? Who’s going to want to move there? They aren’t pushing me out of what I know and love. I’m going to fight, and particularly for my children."
“Well, I had only been there for 5 weeks. I’d just gotten the job [and] moved here. No one was ordering me to cover [TMI]. For the first night I went down, I went down to see it— I had a friend and I asked him to drive me down. There were people in moon suits taking radiation readings the first night.”
"Jim Hurst and Don Hosser. They were head of PANE, and that was the first group that I joined. Don Hosser is the typically old professor. I’d say ‘Don, let’s put the axe to these guys. Let’s go in there.’ And Don would say, ‘No, Joyce. Wait a minute.’ I’ve learned over the years that it’s alright to be passionate about something, but you also have to be realistic. Nuclear power is not going away. Do we sit here and fight constantly, or do we find mutual things that we can do to make it better?"
“Well, I had only been there for 5 weeks. I’d just gotten the job [and] moved here. No one was ordering me to cover [TMI]. For the first night I went down, I went down to see it— I had a friend and I asked him to drive me down. There were people in moon suits taking radiation readings the first night.”
"I remember going to a meeting at the NRC in Maryland. It was Paula and myself in our little Sunday dresses and our little portfolios. All these men walked in Brooks Bros. suits, wingtip shoes and leather briefcases. There must have been about nine of them. They sat down at the table and looked at us and said ‘What do you want?’ I said ‘That we don’t have another accident. I want you to think about my kids every time you make a decision. That’s what I want.’ They did not know what to do because it wasn’t on paper. As long as it looks good on paper, it’s okay. Never mind it’s not functioning out there in the equipment. There’s a disconnect."
“Well, I had only been there for 5 weeks. I’d just gotten the job [and] moved here. No one was ordering me to cover [TMI]. For the first night I went down, I went down to see it— I had a friend and I asked him to drive me down. There were people in moon suits taking radiation readings the first night.”
"I and three other women [founded] Concerned Mothers and Women. All of us had been involved in PANE, and we were sitting around the table and going ‘You know, it’s become such a political issue. It’s become a pro and anti issue. I don’t see it as that. I see it as a health issue for our children, for the future generations that live here.’ My friend said ‘That’s exactly how we feel. Let’s start an organization.’ Politically, I knew it was a barnstormer— are you going to be against the mom and the women? How does that look, sir? I thought that it was something that could make women cohesive and something that was hard to dismiss politically."
"We were the ones who helped push to have the referendum to say we don’t want it. I’m very proud of that because we tried to go through the system to do that. We have to have Concerned Mothers and Women – women of all ages and different stripes and likes and dislikes. They have concern for their children or their nieces or their friends’ children. It doesn't matter the relationship. It’s the caring that counts."
"I knew very early to do things in sound bites. If you wanted to have control over what you said, you better say it in 30 seconds, or it’s not going to be said. I was very aware of that. I remember going to an NRC meeting, of course they have all these people and cameras and everything. One of the guys said: ’Hypothetically, getting this radiation is like having a drink of wine or a cigarette [health-wise].’ I said to him: ‘First of all, I don’t have hypothetical children. Secondly, in the state of Pennsylvania, it’s illegal to give my children wine and cigarettes. So why can you?’"
So Denton had a press conference at about 10 o’clock on a Friday night. They used to have an old media center— really small room up on top floor of the capitol. And I can remember waiting for that. The click of the cameras… in the old days, the cameras would make a clicking noise and it was almost intense the way he walked out there; no one had seen him [before]. He was able to start relaying information in a more folksy style. A calming style from the start. Denton was a real change in terms of just trying to understand it. I had no reason to doubt him.
The UPI, the United Press, was talking about a meltdown fear. It was later, I think, later on you were getting the [hydrogen] bubble story. [It] was developing later that day maybe even. So that might have been what Denton was addressing when he first got here, into that Saturday and Sunday.
"There were people who came in from California to teach us nonviolent resistance. I’m going, ‘These are a bunch of hippies. I can't do it.’ I said, ‘Listen to me. I’m a middle-aged woman. If I’m going to go down there and fight, I’m not going to be nice. I’m not going to hurt anyone, but I’m not just going to sit there and let someone pick me up and move me around. It’s not going to happen.’ They asked who wanted to go and who didn’t. I did not have a problem doing that. I thought [that] it won't change anything, but it will surely bring a lot of media to see [that] people are willing, in a small conservative community, to do things like that. "
So Denton had a press conference at about 10 o’clock on a Friday night. They used to have an old media center— really small room up on top floor of the capitol. And I can remember waiting for that. The click of the cameras… in the old days, the cameras would make a clicking noise and it was almost intense the way he walked out there; no one had seen him [before]. He was able to start relaying information in a more folksy style. A calming style from the start. Denton was a real change in terms of just trying to understand it. I had no reason to doubt him.
The UPI, the United Press, was talking about a meltdown fear. It was later, I think, later on you were getting the [hydrogen] bubble story. [It] was developing later that day maybe even. So that might have been what Denton was addressing when he first got here, into that Saturday and Sunday.
"I remember a neighbor saying to me, ‘I didn’t know you were a radical, Joyce.’ I don't think I’m a radical at all. That’s how conservative these communities are. Really, that’s why that power plant went in down there, because it was a conservative community."
"We were all going on the island. Paula and myself and Mary – I don’t remember who else. Anyway, we went and got [arrested.] The state police were wonderful. They said ‘Okay, girls, get up there. We got to take your picture.’ We’re supposed to have a record of that. They did not make a record of it. They were very good about that. There were a lot of people who understood."
"[My husband] was supportive. He believed that those guys would get their act together down there and fix things up, and things would be okay. For him to be involved, it would have been the end of our family. Someone had to be home. There were many meetings I would have loved to have gone [to], but I had to pick my fights. I had to balance between what I did for my children and my husband and what I did with that. I don't regret that one moment because I chose being a wife and a mother long before I chose to be involved in this. But I also had the right to fight for what I believed in. God bless my husband. He was supportive when I did that."
"I was at home. The information started coming over the radio, and my husband was home, which is unusual because he was an engineer on the railroad. I said ‘Mario, we are leaving. I don’t know what’s going on. I know it can be potentially very dangerous. We’re getting out of here.’ We had a preschooler at the time. Anyone with preschool children, anyone that was pregnant, they advised to leave. He said ‘Okay.’"
Story of a Concerned Mother:
Joyce Corradi
"My parents lived in Perry County, which was about 35 miles from where we lived. So we left and went there. While I was there, I’m watching the TV constantly. The more I watched, the more confused and angry I got. I’m going: ‘They don’t know what’s happening. They don’t know how to fix it. The company’s lying.’ Conflicting accounts. When I’m trying to base a decision for the well-being of my children on these people and I can't, that’s where my frustration goes. After I was gone for 10 days, I came back [and] said ‘I’m going to some meetings.’"
"It was the 30th anniversary. My grandchildren – they were about 5, 6, 7 years old. My daughter takes them down to see the stuff they had on TMI down at the college, and there’s this giant picture of me. They came home and went ‘Nana, there’s a great big picture of you. Nana, I didn’t know you were angry.’ I said ‘Yes, they were doing something that I thought was scary, and they hurt your moms and dads.’ That’s all they need to know. But this was another thing I said to them: ‘Remember if there’s something you feel is very wrong, you should be allowed to be angry, too.’"
"How can your government let you down? They let you down by letting the accident happen. Now they’re going to let you down because politically or economically just doesn't suit [them.] It has nothing to do with right or wrong. That’s the sad thing about government and court systems. It’s not about justice. That implementation is influenced greatly by finances. Ask anyone who’s poor how the justice system works, and they’ll tell you. I would love it that it wasn’t that way, but I know I’m not going to see it in my lifetime."
"[I feel] satisfaction that I opened my mouth and I didn’t sit still, and sadness that there isn’t a real answer to it yet. I have no regret. Absolutely none. "
"I always admired Eleanor Roosevelt. I thought – these are strong women who really cared about what they were doing. They didn’t try to approach it as a man would, and that’s what we were taught. They really approached it as a woman seeing a problem. I often thought about that when we went to a meeting and things like that. What would these women do in this situation? What would they say? How would they handle that? If you aren’t authentic about who you are and what you believe in, no matter what someone else thinks or says, you’ll never survive."
Paula and I sat down one day and we said ‘You know, if we had a year with no commitments, we could take them through the wringer.’ We had to go to a meeting for two hours, then we had to run home, we had to make [the] meal, we had to get the kids to soccer, and we had to do all those other things. Those men were paid for every meeting they went to. We were not.