Interview with Oliver Wilhelm Kaufmann, November 29, 2005

Nevada Test Site Oral History Project University of Nevada, Las Vegas Interview with Oliver W. Kaufmann November 29, 2005 By telephone from Las Vegas, NV to Bradenton, FL Interview Conducted By Mary Palevsky © 2007 by UNLV Libraries Oral history is a method of collecting historical information through recorded interviews conducted by an interviewer/ researcher with an interviewee/ narrator who possesses firsthand knowledge of historically significant events. The goal is to create an archive which adds relevant material to the existing historical record. Oral history recordings and transcripts are primary source material and do not represent the final, verified, or complete narrative of the events under discussion. Rather, oral history is a spoken remembrance or dialogue, reflecting the interviewee’s memories, points of view and personal opinions about events in response to the interviewer’s specific questions. Oral history interviews document each interviewee’s personal engagement with the history in question. They are unique records, reflecting the particular meaning the interviewee draws from her/ his individual life experience. Produced by: The Nevada Test Site Oral History Project Departments of History and Sociology University of Nevada, Las Vegas, 89154- 5020 Director and Editor Mary Palevsky Principal Investigators Robert Futrell, Dept. of Sociology Andrew Kirk, Dept. of History The material in the Nevada Test Site Oral History Project archive is based upon work supported by the U. S. Dept. of Energy under award number DEFG52- 03NV99203 and the U. S. Dept. of Education under award number P116Z040093. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in these recordings and transcripts are those of project participants— oral history interviewees and/ or oral history interviewers— and do not necessarily reflect the views of the U. S. Department of Energy or the U. S. Department of Education. UNLV Nevada Test Site Oral History Project 1 Interview with Oliver W. Kaufmann November 29, 2005 Conducted by Mary Palevsky Table of Contents Introduction: Birth, childhood interest in biology, education, works for National Dairy, awareness of nuclear weapon and radiation fallout issues, becomes professor in Department of Food Science at the University of Illinois, marriage and children. 1 Joins the USPHS and relocates to Las Vegas, NV. Discusses USPHS training program. 3 Reaction to the American Southwest and to the NTS. 6 Tells story about security surrounding transport of the atomic bomb. 8 Discusses work on Operation Teapot, setting up of fallout stations and description of their components, evacuation of residents during a test. 9 Recalls experience of seeing above- ground nuclear tests. 12 Details work recovering data after atmospheric tests during Operation Teapot and talked specifically about chasing the cloud during Moth. 14 Impression of Las Vegas, NV in 1955. 19 Interactions with the public during Operation Teapot, and beginning of information period for the public concerning testing. 20 Talks about work with Joseph C. Shaw at University of Connecticut, developing technique of studying stomach contents of cows through holes in sides. 22 Recaps involvement with public during testing, move toward public education about testing, question of what constituted high exposure levels of radiation, and personal concerns about exposure 25 Returns to University of Illinois, transfers to Michigan State University, accepts assignment with Cincinnati Training Facility to train people in dairy and food microbiology, moves to Food and Drug Administration 27 Thoughts on contamination of milk supply and destruction of sheep because of atmospheric testing. 28 Conclusion: Nevada Test Site past and present— test site tour and the Atomic Testing Museum. 30 UNLV Nevada Test Site Oral History Project 1 Interview with Oliver W. Kaufmann November 29, 2005 By telephone from Las Vegas, NV to Bradenton, FL Conducted by Mary Palevsky [ 00: 00: 00] Begin Track 2, Disc 1. Oliver W. Kaufmann: My name is Oliver W. Kaufmann. I was born in Hartford, Connecticut, June 8, 1918. [ Mother, Mary Stoltz Kaufmann, father, Wilhelm Kaufmann]. I attended the University of Connecticut where I received my Bachelor of Science degree and my Master of Science degree. I was always interested in biology and living things, so it was natural for me to be interested in such things as the Atomic Energy Commission’s [ AEC] interest in fallout and so forth. Mary Palevsky: Now, just to spend a couple of seconds on your childhood, in what sense were you always interested in living things? For two summers while I was in grammar school, I attended a program sponsored by the Children’s Museum of Hartford in which we studied birds and bees and everything else, and after three years I was one of two people who had earned more than 500 points in the study of geology and birds and lands and everything of this nature. Wow. OK. So with the [ Nevada] test site [ NTS], give me a little bit of a sense of your awareness both with the end of World War II and the atomic bombings in Japan and what came afterwards; your knowledge, your general knowledge of what nuclear weapons and radiation effects and things like that were up to the time at which you end up going to the test site. Would you come again, please? I’m sorry. Can you hear me OK? Well, I have a hearing problem, so I’m on a special phone, but I hear fairly well. UNLV Nevada Test Site Oral History Project 2 OK, I’ll speak more slowly. Since you ended up going, as you told me before we started recording, out to the test site, I’m wondering at the time, in the early fifties, what your awareness was as a scientist of nuclear weapons, radiation issues, fallout issues, just the subject matter in general. Very little. OK. Where had you been at the end of the war when Japan was bombed with the atomic bombs? I was working in the food research group with National Dairy in New York City, and the research I was doing there led to the development of a new treatment for starving Japanese children and for the treatment of ulcers. Patients at Bellevue City Hospital were eating the material that we were developing to help them cure their ulcers. Interesting. And since I had been refused a commission after graduating from a four- year ROTC program, I was subject to the draft, but I was able to convince the people I talked to that not only was the work I was doing important, but that I had volunteered to serve as an officer and was rejected for a physical reason. So they finally gave me a working deferment, and as soon as the war ended, I made plans to go back to school and get my Ph. D. degree. OK. And you did that at Purdue [ University], you said. Yes, I left New York City and National Dairy and went to Purdue University where I took my Ph. D. degree in 1950. OK. And then where did you go from Purdue? From Purdue I went to the University of Illinois. So you were a professor there? Yes, in the Department of Food Science. UNLV Nevada Test Site Oral History Project 3 Now what was it that you think— you said before we began recording that you were contacted by the [ United States] Public Health Service [ USPHS]? Yes. Well, I used to attend scientific meetings in Chicago and gave several papers there, and after one of the papers this gentlemen who was a member of the Public Health Service stationed in Chicago came up to me, and I had known him briefly anyway, and asked me if I would be interested in doing this work out at Las Vegas [ Nevada] because he knew I was interested in research and in various things and so he suggested, Why don’t you consider joining the Public Health Service and seeing if you can work out there? And I said, I’ll give it some thought, and said yes, I would. [ 00: 05: 00] Now were you married at the time or single? I was married when I was at Purdue to Katherine Joseph, and I have two children. I left a three-or- four- month- old boy to go to Las Vegas. OK. So tell me about what that’s like, going from Chicago? At this point, do you know that it’s going to be related to questions of fallout? How much do you know? I knew very little, but I’m interested in the idea of something new and adventuresome. Great. Great. So tell me what that was like. When I was out there, I was amazed; I was dumbfounded; I thought it was great. I was completely unaware of the danger involved and no one emphasized that point and so all of us went glibly along, thinking that there was no problem from a public health point of view, which later turned out there might be some. So first you go for training, you said. Yes. What kinds of things are they teaching you about when you go? UNLV Nevada Test Site Oral History Project 4 They taught us how to read radioactive fallout disks and how to put up monitors and a little bit about the bomb itself. I was rather impressed with the fact that— two or three of us one evening, we’re sitting in our room in the barracks discussing how tall the towers were from which the shots were dropped, and someone knocked on the door and said to us, It’s not necessary to discuss that. We then began to realize how secret a lot of this stuff was. So we weren’t to talk about it and we weren’t to talk about a lot of things. We were told, for example, that the “ sheep problem” was not a problem. The sheep problem. Yes, there were some radioactive sheep or animals that had been subject to fallout and we were told that the animals were suffering or were dying from something else, not radioactive exposure. And what did you make of that at the time? Oh. Well, we believed it. We thought, well, they know they didn’t die of that, and having somewhat of an inquisitive nature, I believed what I heard until I found out otherwise. Interestingly enough, we were given a trip at the end of our training program to St. George, Utah. We were told to go up there and talk to the people and spend the night and come on back, to give us some idea of the terrain we would be in and the people we would meet. Later I find out that St. George, Utah was exposed to a little radiation at one time or another. Right. So this is part of the training that they send you up there? Yes, we stayed one night in a hotel in St. George, Utah. About six or eight of us drove up in two or three cars. So ostensibly what was the purpose of going there? To learn a little bit about the countryside, because I had been an Easterner, I had never been out West, and to find out what the people did in St. George, where the fallout stations were, and to UNLV Nevada Test Site Oral History Project 5 come back another route so that we went through Tonopah [ Nevada] so that we would just know something about the area in general. Right. Now just to help me understand your understanding of what that training was, because I have a question that arises. You seem to be saying that you’re being reassured about the sheep and you’re not being particularly concerned about fallout in St. George, but it also seems to me that you’re there for some kind of monitoring purpose. Not monitoring purpose, but to learn if, for example, you were to be ordered to St. George, we would know where it was and we’d know something about the vicinity. Because most of us didn’t know anything about the West at all, didn’t know what we would encounter, and to give us some feel for what our work might involve. OK. So, just so I understand it, you’re training is in case there were a fallout situation? I’m trying to understand what the purpose of your position was. Yes, just to give us some training through the travels we might encounter, the little cities and towns you might go through, or give us some idea of what the environment was like around Camp Mercury. [ 00: 10: 00] OK. So this training lasted how long, you said? Two weeks. And what other kind of scientific stuff did you learn about fallout at that time? How to use radioactive devices. We toured Yucca Flats and saw the effects of atomic detonations. We were calculating radiation doses and so forth. To give us some background as to what our unit was supposed to study when we were out there; we were to collect data. Great. Now you said you went in fall of 1954? Is that right? I said I was contacted in Chicago in the fall of ’ 54 and went to training in December of ’ 54. UNLV Nevada Test Site Oral History Project 6 Got it. OK. What did you think of the American Southwest desert when you came? Real different from the East Coast. I couldn’t believe it. I mean it was great. I wrote a postcard I have here in front of me to my mother and father and I said something like— I said, “ This is quite an experience. It’s a beautiful country.” Yes. Now at that time, when you first go for your training, were there tests going on at the test site when you go? There had been a few tests, I’m saying ten or fifteen as near as I can tell. There had been some tests, some bombs detonated before I got out there, yes. There were three series, I believe, I forget what they call them, but my guess is it involved about fifteen or twenty atomic drops before I got out there. Right. I’m looking at my schedule and I think the one closest before you was in spring of ’ 53. That could be right. Called Operation Upshot- Knothole. Right. That was it. So you’re looking at radiation effects that have come to be on the test site before you arrive. No, future drops. Now tell me about the other people in your cohort. Were they all at the same level of education as you were? I wish I could tell you. I really don’t know. I only remember four names. Two of the people whom I worked with and studied with, they were up in the, I believe, the Health Department or some unit in Utah. One was a commissioned officer from New York City who was stationed in UNLV Nevada Test Site Oral History Project 7 California, and the other individual I didn’t know where he was from. There was very little time for socialization. OK. And who are the people? It’s the Public Health Service. Are you interacting with Atomic Energy Commission people at this point, or are you pretty much your own group? No, there was a group of Public Health Service people, I’m just going to guess ten, I could be way off, but I was the only one that was stationed at the base. The other eight or nine or whatever they were, were stationed around the countryside. They were stationed in Tonopah, they were stationed in California, they were stationed in Vegas. I was stationed at Camp Mercury proper, so my assignment was to cover the fallout that occurred in and around Camp Mercury from, let’s say, Camp Mercury north to Beatty [ Nevada] and south through Nellis Air Force Base [ Nevada]. That was my area. OK. Now you were in the barracks at Mercury? Yes. Now were there other armed forces people stationed there at the time? Well, during my training program and while I was there for six weeks, there were a lot of people milling around and I didn’t know who they were and there wasn’t very much communication between groups. We all had our small group. We did our own work. Oh, yes, there were a lot of people milling around. I don’t know who they all were. OK. And just to give me a sense of what your impressions of Mercury itself were, the setup there [ 00: 15: 00] and the buildings and the activities, what was that like? Well, just like being in the Army. We had our barracks. I stayed in the barracks. I roomed with a security officer and we talked occasionally. I guess he left earlier than I did. But we talked occasionally, and on one occasion I asked him, you know, I knew the bombs came from off the UNLV Nevada Test Site Oral History Project 8 site, and I said, Well, what happens if a car approaches you and you’re leading the truck with the bomb on it into the Mercury site proper? And he said, I run that car off the road. I didn’t believe him, so I don’t know, a week or two or three later, and this would be when I was there for my six- week tour, I saw the sheriff’s car coming with all the lights blinking and I knew darn well he was driving it and in back of it was a truck pulling the atomic bomb. So I pulled over and I kept on the road like I was going to keep on going, and he just drove me off the road. I just drove off the road until the vehicle carrying the bomb went by, and proceeded back on the road again. But he wasn’t kidding. He said the rule is there’s supposed to be: “ no moving vehicle passes the atomic bomb.” Near as I can tell, the bomb was stationed just on the Nellis Air Force Base property or at the Nellis Air Force Base interface of the Nevada Test Site, within a mile or two of the entrance, the old entrance to Mercury. Right. Well, that’s an interesting story because it brings out the fact that you’re a scientist, that he told you this but you had to verify it in experimental terms. Well, I had a blue car, he knew that, so I thought he would know it was someone from the camp, but regardless, no moving vehicle goes by the atomic bomb. Wow. So when you’re training finished, two- week training, did you go back to Chicago? I was living in Champaign- Urbana [ Illinois] at the time; I rejoined my family in Champaign- Urbana. I was still teaching at the University of Illinois. OK. So when does your six- week tour come? That starts in February of 1955. OK. So there is actually an operation going on at the test site then? Not that I know of. You mean in February 1955? Yes. UNLV Nevada Test Site Oral History Project 9 Yes. Operation Teapot started. Correct. So did you go to be working during that operation? Yes, I worked on Operation Teapot for six weeks. OK, let’s talk about that. We dropped eight bombs. Eight bombs. Eight bombs, yes. So tell me what your job was like from day to day as this operation is going forward. Well, the devices were always dropped at dawn or predawn, and a lot a depended on the wind direction. So we’d prepare for an operation on Tuesday morning and I wouldn’t do very much except get ready to go up and see the bomb go off, and by twelve o’clock midnight they would cancel it because the wind direction had changed. And then we’d sit around all day Wednesday or Thursday and wait for the wind to change, and so we did a lot. While I was assigned on the base, I did some lab work. OK, what did that involve? It involved testing the radiation disks that came back in, to see how much radiation there was. But my major time was spent, when there was no bomb going off, my major time was spent inspecting the various fallout stations I had set up from Beatty all the way south to the Air Force base. OK, let me get some detail here. You set up these stations. Right. What did a fallout station look like? What were its components? UNLV Nevada Test Site Oral History Project 10 Just a post with a tray on it on which we’d put a radioactive plate of some sort which would pick up radioactive waves. OK. And what was the plate made out of that it would do that? Oh, gosh, I don’t remember. I know we set up one— do you know whether or not there’s a school as you enter Beatty? I don’t, but we can find out. It was either just outside of Beatty or Tonopah and I don’t know which. I think it was Beatty There was a house of prostitution well- known in Nevada, of course, and I set up a radioactive station there because the school was located right next to it and we wanted to know the radiation that might possibly leave fallout in the area where there were schoolchildren. [ 00: 20: 00] Now I’ve heard that story, that there was a station in one of the houses of prostitution. Right. So you’re the person who set that up. It was on the left side of the road as you approach either Beatty or Tonopah, but I’ll bet it was Beatty. OK, I’ll find out. [ Beatty is correct]. Another interesting thing is one morning a gentleman came out from the house and said, Hey, you want to come in and have a cup of coffee? And I said sure, so I went in and had a cup of coffee. So did you have to interact with the owners of the brothel to set the thing up? Yes. I inquired of somebody there, would they permit me to come on their property and set up this station. We did that at any place we went. If we set them up at a gas station or wherever, we UNLV Nevada Test Site Oral History Project 11 would ask for permission to set it up. Most of the time, they were only too happy to have the fallout tray near their property so they could get some idea as to what their fallout exposure was. They cleared it with us, yes. OK. So you had had the job of setting all these things up. In my area, which extended from the camp up through Beatty. I had the desert, of course, too, but not too much happened there. Right. So you’d pick, according to certain distances and wind patterns, I guess, you’d decide where you want to put them? Right, and the particular spots like where there might be a school or a public building of some sort. On one of these, I didn’t have a fallout tray, but on one event, after one bomb, I was traveling up [ Highway] 95 towards Beatty and there was a motel on the right- hand side of the road as you go towards Beatty. Had to evacuate all the people in the motel because the wind shifted and the radiation was likely to blow over that area, so we evacuated all the people from the motel. When you go to do that, what did you tell people? Well, you had to be very careful because this is dawn and most people, you know, don’t want to wake up at that hour. [ You] just tell them there’s a radioactive cloud that may hit this area and we’re advising them, not ordering them, but advising them or requesting that they leave the area. Most of them did. We were told and taught to be somewhat tactful in this approach so that they wouldn’t get too upset and blow their head off or something or other. Right. That’s the only evacuating group that I ever dealt with. UNLV Nevada Test Site Oral History Project 12 OK. So I want to back up a little bit and ask you if you recall the experience of seeing your first nuclear test. Oh, yes. Can you talk to me a little bit about that? You never forget it. I had to go out to the test site and we were located, I don’t know how many miles from the tower at Yucca Flats. There was a little shack up there, and there were, oh, it was maybe eight or ten people there, dignitaries of some sort, and I was stationed there. It’s like a living monster when it goes off. When you finally turn around, I don’t know if you got my other note or not, but in the shack we were told how to behave when the shot went off. We were to face away from the shot and put our faces and our bodies against the wall of this wooden shack that we were working out of and to put our hands over our eyes, count to ten, before we turned around to see the shot. When the shot went off, you could see the blood vessels and bones in your hand covering your eyes, the blast is so intense. And just about the time you saw those and realized it, you felt something hitting you in the back of the head; it was the heat, the shock wave passing by. After the shock wave passed by, you were permitted or you could turn around and see the shot. By that time it was, I don’t know how many feet off the ground, but it was a rolling, boiling cauldron, and it kept going and boiling up and this, and then the sand in the desert seemed to come up, making a saucer around it. It’s just like a big monster going up, and it was quite impressive, believe me. Incidentally, the man who told us to cover our eyes and be sure not to turn around was blind, and I was told that he had turned around too early and the intensity of the shot had blinded him. Really. I never heard that story. UNLV Nevada Test Site Oral History Project 13 [ 00: 25: 00] Yes, well, that’s the story they told us. Anyway, we covered our eyes thoroughly. There were only maybe five or six, let’s say, personnel there, like working personnel. There may have been six or eight visiting dignitaries, senators or somebody or other, you know, or somebody from one of the test operations there. But it was never a big group, maybe eight or ten people there at the command post. But it was— you never forget it. I tell you what, it’s ruined the Fourth of July. Why? You can’t make a firecracker big enough. Oh, I see. But you didn’t have goggles on. You just had your hands over your eyes, is that what you’re saying? Well yes, we had goggles on and our hands were over the goggles. Got it. OK. Over the goggles, yes. And your eyes were closed and your hands were over the goggles and you still saw the— Right, you could see the blood vessels and the bones in your fingers. Yes. It was something. Wow. Yes. And you saw several of these shots, is that correct? I saw eight. You saw the whole series? Well, no, I missed nine and ten, I believe. The ninth shot was an aerial shot, the first time they set two shots off the same day; at the ninth shot I think I was on my way back to Vegas to take a plane or a train back home, so I didn’t see that last— ninth shot. I think there were ten shots in the series. I saw eight; I saw the first eight. UNLV Nevada Test Site Oral History Project 14 Wow. OK. I’m just looking at the— I have a little list here of the shots. [ Referring to DOE/ NV— 209- Rev 15 pp. 4- 7] Yes, I’ve got a list here, too. I saw through— I think there were— it looks like there were nine. One, two, three [ sound of pages turning], four, five, six, seven, eight, nine. . . . That was Wasp Prime. There was test HA after that, test Post after that, test MET after that, and that’s the last one. Wait a minute. There was test Apple- 2 and test Zucchini. According to my records here. [ Total of 14 tests listed for Operation Teapot. Dr, Kaufmann observed tests 1- 8, through Apple 1 on March 29, 1995] What’s interesting about that— OK, there’s Wasp Prime. I see it. Got it. Wasp Prime, Post, MET, Apple- 2, and Zucchini. Yes. So the biggest I’m seeing, looks like the biggest test in this series was Turk:. forty- three kilotons. That’s twice as big as the bombs on Japan. Yes, that’s a big one. And you saw that one. Right. I got a note on my paper down here that says, “ It was something!” Yes. Now not to press this too much but by the time you’ve seen a few shots, are you seeing the differences between the smaller ones and the larger ones as far as—? I think you notice a little difference, yes. Some of them didn’t seem to go up quite as high as the others. Maybe the diameter didn’t seem to be quite as large. They were all impressive but there was a little bit of a difference. And you couldn’t tell. Sometimes the wind would be blowing your shot away from it and it would look whiter because the wind was blowing the shot away from you, you know. UNLV Nevada Test Site Oral History Project 15 Interesting. And I have another sort of general question to help me to understand your work a little better. These atmospheric shots are going off in the desert and you’re setting out these monitoring stations. As a member of the Public Health Service, are you thinking in terms of safety issues with fallout? And there’s a second part to this. As a scientist, obviously, are you thinking about scientific data as well as about fallout effects? Are you making a distinction between those two things? Not really. I think you’re too busy watching the cloud and trying to figure out where that cloud is so you can go and make contact with it and determine the level of fallout. The time I went through Nellis Air Force Base when I was on the Tiger bombing range, the shot went the wrong way and no one at the base realized— well, they realized it but didn’t want to know what the fallout was, so they just said make contact with the cloud. So you’re busy watching your radioactive meters and driving and trying to find out when you first made contact with that cloud so you can radio back the information to the camp. [ 00: 30: 00] Oh, great. So tell me more about that, making contact with the cloud. The detonation goes off, as far as I understand. Right. You observe it for some period of time? You observe it to see which way it’s going, is that right? My assignment was to be the first one out. From that lookout point, my assignment was to be the first one out of that lookout spot. As I left Camp Mercury at [ Highway] 95 there, I was told by radio to either go north or south because they thought the cloud was going up towards Beatty or down towards Vegas. At the campsite I was told which way they thought the cloud would go and my job was to make contact with the cloud if possible, either on the way towards Beatty or the UNLV Nevada Test Site Oral History Project 16 other way, so I could radio back to the base commanders what radiation levels I was experiencing, if any, as I traveled up and down 95 or off on the side roads. How interesting! So explain to a layperson like me what exactly making contact with the cloud means. When the dial on your radioactive device goes way up high. You may read something like ten or eleven, and these numbers are just guesses, if it goes up to 100, 200, you know you’ve made contact with the cloud. A hundred or two hundred— Well, don’t use these— No, but I’m saying, what is the unit of measure here? Rads, I guess. OK. No— we know you’re giving an example, that this isn’t some sort of scientific statement. If the meter would read nothing and all of a sudden would pop up to some level, then you knew you’d made contact. OK. And are you visually also seeing the cloud at this point? Maybe not. Probably not. It’s dispersed. To see the cloud, you’d have to be almost— you’d have to be rather close. The radiation would fall out from the cloud, so the radiation level could be miles from the center of the cloud, so to speak, and you’d begin to pick up the level of radiation. I understand. Along that line, I have an interesting thing I might read to you here. It regards, oh, let me see, higher readings. Let me check to see; it’s, I believe it’s shot number two, Moth. I’ll read you the UNLV Nevada Test Site Oral History Project 17 paragraph. “ Higher readings, 200 to 310 mR [ milliroentgens] per hour were obtained north of Highway 95 on the Game Refuge Road and on the road from Indian Springs.” [ See attached letter dated February 23, 1955]. I went south out of the Mercury campsite to the Nellis Air Force Base when they decided the cloud was going to go over Nellis Air Force Base and they told me to head into Nellis Air Force Base and make contact with the cloud. They neglected to tell me that I was going to be on the Nellis Air Force Base bombing range, which was active at twelve noon, and when I told them where I was, they said, Did you clear with Nellis Air Force Base? I said, No, you ordered me to. You were supposed to clear. So they finally cleared. And I was driving a blue Ford car. Guess what the bombing target was? Old blue Ford cars abandoned by the people at the base. No way! Yes. Now to continue, it says, get this, “ No EBDs,” that’s effective biological dose, “ have been calculated. There were no people in such areas other than Kaufmann, Seal, Harris, and Coleman.” Seal was my partner. They had high levels of radiation but there were no people in such areas other than the four of us on duty. Oh, and then it says, “ By the way, Seal and Kaufmann returned with many trophies, old pieces of bombs.” I don’t recall that but we returned with a lot of radiation, I remember that. Now did you take any special steps when you had—? Well, this was about eight or nine o’clock in the morning and we drove all day through the desert because we were lost, and finally we followed some old road beds and creeks and finally came to a big, flat, dead lake and made a left turn somehow or other and ended up hitting a guard at Camp Mercury. He stopped us, and he knew we were lost because he had been told to be on the [ 00: 35: 00] watch for someone. So he let us int