Awards

• Short-listed for Oregon Book Awards (Nonfiction) 2005

Overview

Explores the clash between a small mining town high up in Colorado’s Rocky Mountains and the federal government, determined to clean up the toxic mess left from a hundred years of mining. Explores the challenges to local autonomy and community identity brought by a struggle for economic survival, unyielding government policy, and long-term health consequences induced by extractive-industry practices.

Full Product Details

9781559633857

Table of Contents

Reviews

"""An astonishing book...an excellent book, both as an environmental case study, and as a dramatic reminder that the battle is not over yet.""-- ""Daily News"" ""Klucas weaves details of history, geology and government policy while populating the story with characters...with the precious and eye of a good novelist.""-- ""Anniston Star"" ""This excellent narrative chronicles the decades-long battle to clean up the town and to redefine it after the collapse of the mining industry....Klucas accomplishes the almost impossible task of making thickets of environmental science, politics and litigation come alive, offering both a pointed critique of a badly drafted Superfund law--which some feel encourages lawsuits more than cleanups--and insights into other approaches. With evenhanded sympathy for all parties as they groped their way forward from intransigence to cooperation, she presents a fascinating inside look at one of the most heated environmental issues of the day.""-- ""Publishers Weekly"""

Magazine journalist Klucas debuts with a patiently detailed unfolding of the environmental missteps that have marked the entire history of Leadville, Colorado. The town sits atop an impressive array of mineral deposits: silver and gold, copper and manganese, molybdenite, and, of course, lead. This variety, explains Klucas, allowed Leadville to survive when other one-horse mining burgs went bust. During its heyday, the town hosted Oscar Wilde and Sarah Bernhardt at the opera, made a multimillionaire of Meyer Guggenheim, and generated enormous quantities of waste. Even during lean times, Leadville was a community tightly knit by friendship, camaraderie, and pride in its mining tradition. But tunnels often burped a gush of suspended metals into the Arkansas River, creating Technicolor hues. One spectacular belch coincided with the rise of environmental concern across the country, bringing the EPA, the CDC, and other federal agencies to Leadville's door and earning it a reputation as the Rockies' Poison Central. At this moment, the story gets really interesting, and the author's clarifying touch pays off. The defenders of the environment came on like gangbusters, alienating the citizenry to such an extent that they found the EPA more toxic than the tailings. Klucas shows that all concerned parties acted in their own worst interests: the regulators creating a stultifying bureaucracy, the mine operators treating the problem as a legal rather than an engineering issue, the Colorado attorney general filing an absurd class-action lawsuit. Any law that invites this much litigation is poorly drafted, one judge commented, referring to the Superfund's severe liability provisions and general clumsiness. Why should you pass a law that is so complicated that everyone spends more on lawyers than they do on the technical side solving the problem? Character sketches provide a refreshing break from all the legal squabbling and stalling; Klucas makes even the drab players as bright as the river. Meticulous almost to a fault, but flashing with human interest and keen environmental insight: an illuminating march through environmental politics at a turning point in green awareness. (Kirkus Reviews)

This excellent narrative chronicles the decades-long battle to clean up the town and to redefine it after the collapse of the mining industry....Klucas accomplishes the almost impossible task of making thickets of environmental science, politics and litigation come alive, offering both a pointed critique of a badly drafted Superfund law--which some feel encourages lawsuits more than cleanups--and insights into other approaches. With evenhanded sympathy for all parties as they groped their way forward from intransigence to cooperation, she presents a fascinating inside look at one of the most heated environmental issues of the day. --Publishers Weekly An astonishing book...an excellent book, both as an environmental case study, and as a dramatic reminder that the battle is not over yet. --Daily News Klucas weaves details of history, geology and government policy while populating the story with characters...with the precious and eye of a good novelist. --Anniston Star

Author Information

Gillian Klucas, a talented journalist who has written for High Country News. On Earth, Preservation, and other magazines, became so intrigued by Leadville's multifaceted story that she moved there. This is her first book.

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