Image of Denise Brock
St. Louis' Erin Brockovich
By Geri L. Dreiling
Photograph by Scott Rovak
Denise Brock can’t remember a time when her father, Christopher Davis, a former nuclear weapons worker at Mallinckrodt Chemical Works, wasn’t sick. He battled one cancer after another, but the disease eventually spread from his lungs to his liver and brain. In 1978, Brock’s senior year in high school, he died.
Twenty-two years later, a federal law was passed to compensate weapons workers who had gotten cancer after being exposed to staggering doses of radiation while building the U.S. atomic weapons arsenal. Brock set out to help her mother, Evelyn Davis Coffelt, receive the $150,000 payment—and found herself working on behalf of thousands of Mallinckrodt workers and their families.
In 2003, the grass-roots organization, United Nuclear Weapons Workers, was born in Brock’s mobile home. She pushed through changes in the law that made it easier for thousands of Mallinckrodt workers to receive compensation, andwhen a claim stalled, she battled government scientists and prodded politicians.
This November, Brock unveiled a memorial to Mallinckrodt’s nuclear weapons workers at the Weldon Spring Site Interpretive Center, where one of Mallinckrodt’s plants once stood. The Weldon Spring site now serves as a burial ground for radioactive waste and contaminated soil.
Are you sick of being called St. Louis' Erin Brockovich? I'm flattered—but I'd rather people focused on the workers.
Did you always suspect that your father's cancer had something to do with his work at Mallinckrodt? Not until I researched it did I think, “Oh my God, they poisoned these workers.” Then, when my mother got paid, we both got letters that basically said, “We did this. We gave your husband”—my father—“enough radiation to cause his cancer and ultimately his death.” So it was bittersweet: You are happy that you have that admission. You are happy that there is some financial apology to an elderly woman whose life could have been much different. But you feel absolutely sick.
What were you doing before you took on this crusade? I was a reserve police officer doing investigative work on the side.
Soon your phone was ringing with please for help from other workers and their families. Why get involved? I had workers come to my house, crying, saying ‘I’m going to quit.’ They would have a questionnaire in their hand with questions like “Which radionuclides and isotopes were you exposed to?” Those people didn’t know that. And if they were a spouse or child of someone who was deceased—hell, all I knew was the name Mallinckrodt. I didn’t know anything about what my dad did.
Did he not talk about it? It was classified. The workers were investigated by the FBI. They were told to never, ever, ever, ever repeat anything—and they knew very little. They were told that they were working with “green salt” and “tube alloy” and “biscuit” and “juice.” Years later, when they were supposed to answer questions, they would just quit and say, “This is too difficult. I’m too sick. I don’t understand it.”
Did you ever want to quit? Never. The more walls they put up, the harder I wanted to fight.
Just what was Mallinckrodt's role? Mallinckrodt supplied purified uranium in 1942 for the first self-sustaining nuclear reaction, and its success led to the development of the atomic bomb—and a continued role processing uranium.
You pushed for special status for Mallinckrodt workers, and, after a lengthy battle, the government agreed to give it to workers from the downtown plant. What difference did that make? It means that workers who worked at least 250 days and had one of at least 22 listed cancers would be able to receive their $150,000 automatically. They would not have to go through dose reconstruction, where health physicists put all the numbers in a computer to measure the odds that the cancer was caused by radiation.
What gave you the idea of a memorial? The Mallinckrodt workers are heroes. They have given to their country well beyond their knowledge, and they needed a tribute. We talked to the Ironworkers Local 396 about building an arch.
Were you sure the site would welcome such a memorial? No. I went to the Weldon Spring Interpretive Center and spoke with Pam Thompson, who works with the Department of Energy. I said I felt like it would be an olive branch—and the Department of Energy agreed and paid for the wall display behind the arch. I think it’s wonderful.
What's next? It feels like it will never be done. Even though the law states that these are to be automatic payments, there are still many nuances. Sometimes things get stuck. Meanwhile, many people are not even aware of this program. Mallinckrodt hired 3,500 workers directly—and this law also covers subcontractors, many of whom may have a check waiting and don’t realize it.
