For nearly four decades, Monsanto Company dumped toxic waste into the local environment of Anniston, Alabama. PCBs were manufactured at this plant, and found their way into local landfills and waterways.
Monsanto engaged in many cover up activities. They bought their 70-acre plant in Anniston in 1935, and documents dating back to the mid-1930s reveal that company officials were aware of the devestating health effects caused by PCBs. Then, in 1966, a biologist hired by Monsanto placed bluegill fish along a creek in Anniston. All of the fish died within 3 1/2 minutes. The descriptions of the fish's death is pretty gruesome:
"I've never seen anything like it in my life," said Mack Finley, another former Ferguson grad student, now an aquatic biologist at Austin Peay State University. "Their skin would literally slough off, like a blood blister on the bottom of your foot."
But Monsanto stayed quiet for decades, amassing an unfathomable wealth, until the official PCB ban went into effect in the late 1970s.
Today, Anniston is a ghost town. Many residents got sick with various illnesses, and some left. To date, Monsanto still has not been forced to clean up the poisonous mess it left in this small town.
This sounds like a terrible, horror movie, but its real. Now, innocent people like Lucy are suffering because of it. It's a sad day.
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