Nevada Test Site: Mary Dickson
My name is Mary Dickson. I am a lifelong resident of Salt Lake City, Utah and a survivor of nuclear weapons tests conducted by the U.S. government. Like tens of thousands of Americans, I grew up under the clouds of radioactive fallout from nuclear weapons testing.
I was only a child during the years of atmospheric detonations in Nevada. How were any of us to know that a silent poison was threading its way through our bodies when a government we trusted repeatedly assured us that “there is no danger” and distributed pamphlets telling us not to let reports of Geiger counters going crazy bother us.
Between 1951 and 1992, the U.S. government detonated 100 nuclear bombs in the atmosphere and 828 underground – most of them far more powerful than the bombs that leveled Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Fallout did not respect county or state borders. Winds carried it hundreds, even thousands of miles away from the Nevada Test Site, as far away as the East Coast and into Canada, exposing countless people living downwind to deadly levels of radiation.
In my 20s, I was diagnosed with thyroid cancer. I underwent a thyroidectomy and radiation treatments. On my hospital door and my hospital bracelet was the radiation symbol. I was the radioactive material. When I left the hospital, doctors cautioned me not to be around pregnant women or young children and not to try to get pregnant for a year. Tumors on my ovaries and uterus a few years later resulted in surgery that meant that I never could have children. Years later, I underwent emergency surgery as a result of scar tissue from that hysterectomy.
My older sister and I compiled a list of childhood friends and neighbors who had cancer, tumors and autoimmune diseases. That list includes 54 people who lived in a five-block area of our childhood neighborhood. In 2001, I added my sister’s name to the list. She was only 46 when she died, leaving 3 young children behind. Now, my younger sister has been told that her rare intestinal cancer has spread to her bladder, breast and brain, and my youngest sister is being treated for autoimmune disorders. My nieces have health issues as well, including breast cancer and autoimmune diseases. It never ends.
I’ve heard countless heartbreaking stories of the harm wreaked on unsuspecting Americans by radioactive fallout. The Cold War had casualties and we are those casualties. We have suffered and continue to suffer. We have comforted the sick, buried and mourned the dead, and worry with each ache, pain and new lump that we are getting sick again. Our families and communities have been devastated physically, emotionally and financially. And the genetic damage has been passed to new generations.
We were patriotic Americans who believed our government when it assured us, “there is no danger.” Our government not only lied to us for decades, but considered us expendable in the name of nuclear deterrence. We have paid and continue to pay an enormous price for our government’s mad rush to win the Cold War arms race.
A government that knowingly harmed its own citizens has a moral responsibility to do right by those harmed. We have worked decades for recognition and justice.
The Radiation Exposure Compensation Act (RECA) of 1990 was a good start, but it wasn’t enough. It was always extremely limited in scope. For instance, neither I, my family, my neighbors nor anyone in northern Utah and surrounding states was included for compensation. Since RECA was signed into law, we have learned much more about the extent of fallout and why the program had to be expanded.
An expansion finally passed the Senate, in large part due to the advocacy of grassroots activists like us along with support from congressional allies and national NGOs such as the Union of Concerned Scientists. The expansion was included in the Budget Reconciliation Bill signed into law July 4, 2025. RECA now covers all of Utah, as well as other states and new categories of claimants. While it was a major victory, it was bittersweet. The expansion came too late for many who died waiting for justice and, sadly, it still excludes too many of our fellow activists and their communities that continue to suffer without help. Our fight is not over.
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