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Interview with Mrs. Mary Margaret Shanahan and Dr. Robley D. Evans by Marks and Miazga conducted inthe Southwest Field Station of the MIT Radioactivity Center; the Field Station is located in Mrs. Shanahan’s home Radioactivity Center is the principal satellite of the Center for Human to obtain Permission for exhumations for the CHR. Director of the MIT Radioactivity Center and Dr. Evans is a consultant to The interview was held at about 3:OO pm on 4 / 2 2 / 74. The MIT The Southwest Field Station is the headquarters for operations Dr. Evans mentioned immediately that he had briefed Mr. Edward J. Bauser of the Joint Committee on Atomic Energy thoroughly on the human plutonium injection program on the Saturday before our visit. Relative tothe matter of obtaining permission for exhumations, Dr. Evans and Mrs. Shanahan recalled that this program was an outgrowth of the activities a t MIT. When Dr. Evans and Mrs. Shanahan transferred their principal locus of activity to Phoenix, they continued to obtain permission for exhumations forDr. Rowland atthe Center for Human Radiobiology. Their principal contact person in the field is Dr; Jan Lieben who formerly performed this function for Dr. Evans when Dr. Lieben was a public health officer in the state of Pennsylvania. Dr. Lieben continued this activity when he left the public health field and assumed his current responsibilities in the FMC Corporation. Authorization to obtain permission for exhumation of the plutonium cases was provided ina memorandum from Dr. Stehney t o Mrs. Shanahan. The memo also provided guidance with respect to what would be told to the survivors in order to gain the permission. The memo, which is available in our files, authorized permission for exhumation t o be obtained for ten cases. Dr. Evans and Mrs. Shanahan contacted the sister of the exhumed patient (HP-4) and obtained permission from her. the brother of the deceased in this case. Dr. Evans said that he and Mrs. Shanahan rather than Dr. Lieben sought the permission because the sister D r . Lieben obtained permission from
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lives in a town near Phoenix and was, therefore, conveniently located. Their approach to the sister was to request permission to study the composition of a mixture of radioactive isotopes and the effects of this bone seeking material that had been given tothe deceased patient at some time before her death. Since the sister did not inquire into the reason for the injections,that issue was not discussed. Before discussing the matter, Dr. Evans acquainted the sister with his and Mrs. Shanahan's credentials as scientists by showing the sister a copy of the book, "Delayed Effects of Bone-seeking Radionuclides" i n which the authorship of a chapter includes Dr. Evans and Mrs. Shanahan. The sister was responsive to the request for permission, which she granted. Dr. Evans and Mrs. Shanahan said that the instructions from Dr. Stehney did not call for mentioning plutonium. When the instructions to seek permission for exhumations were transmitted to Dr. Lieben by Mrs. Shanahan, Dr. Lieben refused to do anything about the matter until the mysterious nature of the project was dispelled for him. Then Mrs. Shanahan discussed the matter briefly with Dr. Lieben and also had him contact Dr. Stehney to get further clarification.After that,Dr. Lieben proceeded t o seek permission for exhumation of the plutonium cases. However, at the time of the interview only one complete permission had been obtained, and t h e exhumation was performed already for that case.