Human Radiation Studies: Remembering the Early Years Oral History of Pathologist S. Marks M.D.

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Human Radiation Studies: Remembering the Early Years Oral History of Pathologist the U.S. Department of Energy Pacific Northwest National Laboratory

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This report was prepared as an account of work sponsored by an agency of the United States Government, Neither the United States Government nor any agency thereof, nor Battelle Memorial Institute, nor any of their employees, makes any warranty, express or implied, or assumes any legal liabilityor responsibilityfor the accuracy, completeness, or.usefulness of any information, apparatus, product, or process disclosed, or represents that its use would not infringe privately owned rights. Reference herein to any specific commercial product, process, or service by trade name, trademark, manufacturer, or otherwise does not necessarily constitute or imply its endorsement, recommendation, or favoring by the United States Government or any agency thereof, or Battelle Memorial Institute. The views and opinions of authors expressed herein do not necessarily state or reflect those of the United States Government or any agency thereof. PACIFIC NORTHWEST NATIONAL LABORATORY UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY 1 2 b 2 5 2 3 @ m e document was printed on recycled paper.

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Human Radiation Studies: Remembering the Early Years Oral History of Pathologist Pacific Northwest National Laboratory

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ORAL HISTORY OF PATHOLOGIST The interview was conducted on October 11, 1995, in Seattle, Washington, by Frank Hungate from Pacific Northwest National Laboratory. Sidney Marh was selected for the oral history project because of his more than 44 years of practical experience in the fields of pathology and radiation. The oral history covers a portion of Dr. Marks’ long career. Dr. Marks was born in Chicago, Illinois, on June 28, 1918. He received his B.S. in 1938 and his M.D. in 1942 from the University of Illinois. In 1961 he received a M.S. from the University of Idaho in physics, based on night school study in the School of Nuclear Engineering, Richland, Washington. Dr. Marks received a Ph.D. in biostatistics from the University of California in 1970. Professional Society Memberships American Association for the Advancement of Science American Statistical Association College of American Pathologists Mathematical Association of America Montogomery County Medical Society Medical and Chirurgical Faculty of Maryland Society for Epidemiologic Research Society for Occupational and Environmental Health Education and Employment HUNGATE:Sid, would you please elaborate on your pre-Hanford background; perhaps identify areas which are relevant to going to Richland. MARKS: My background prior to going to Richland was [spent] obtaining a residency in pathology at Michael Reese Hospital in Chicago; after which I worked at the VA [Veterans Administration] Hospital in Albuquerque, New Mexico, for about a year and a half. Then I was actually ill with tuberculosis for a period of one to two years. [After that] I went to Richland to serve as pathologist at Kadlec Hospital. I was [also] a part-time consultant to the biology lab and did the pathology for the biology group in the Hanford laboratories as it was constituted. I continued in those capacities until 1964 when I started the Ph.D. program at UCLA, and I continued to work 3 months of every year in Richland as pathologist at Kadlec Hospital. I had given up the research at that point. I continued that through 1968, and then I was gone from Richland until I obtained the Ph.D. in 1970. I was subsequently on the faculty of the University of Maryland, then on the staff of the AEC [Atomic Energy Commission]. I continued to do those things

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until, I believe, 1976 when I returned to Richland and served in the Life Sciences Center as assistant manager until 1986. Does that answer your question? HUNGATE:Yes. So you were pretty busy with serving as a consultant for biology and doing your graduate work through the center for quite a period? MARKS: Yes, but upon my return, I no longer worked in Kadlec Hospital at all, I didn’t do any pathology then. HUNGATE:You were strictly with Battelle at that time. MARKS: With Battelle and in an administrative capacity with some participation in the epidemiology and biostatistics programs. HUNGATE:So, at least in part your move west was dictated by health problems, to come to MARKS: No it wasn’t. The TB was over with in 1950. I never had any reoccurrence of it. HUNGATE:Well, great. I was not aware they were able to conquer it prior to that time. MARKS: Subsequently they gave drugs that kind of wiped out the residual infection which prior to that would get reactivated from time to time. HUNGATE:While you were interning at Edgewater [Hospital] and or during your subsequent residency at Michael Reese [Hospital], were you in any way aware of the testing going on at Stagg Field in the interest in the development of radioactivity and MARKS: No, I think 1 had some glimmerings of the fact that there were mysterious things going on at the University of Chicago, but I had no idea what they were. HUNGATE:When you were a medical student, was it common practice to use students as subjects in various research projects that the staff was doing? MARKS: No, it wasn’t. At least not in Illinois. HUNGATE:When I was at Stanford they certainly were. MARKS: Is that right? HUNGATE:I was involved in two or three projects, and I think if I recall Bill Bair’s interview, he mentioned that he also was involved in it. Can you describe some of the experiences whiie you were at Kadlec that were of special interest? You were president of the medical staff at one period. MARKS: I was for a year. The only thing that happened at Kadlec was that I developed a Nuclear Medicine Program there, but it was just a conventional thing.

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MARKS: I think that must have been maybe 1954 or so. I don’t remember. HUNGATE:Because the development of nuclear medicine was something that progressed over a period of time, at least I was not aware of much nuclear medicine when I came to Hanford in 1952. So you must have been one of the early groups that MARKS: I think I was perhaps because of the work going on in the biology lab. But it was strictly conventional nuclear medicine that we did. I don’t remember the date that HUNGATE:Did you interact with Dag Norwood and the HEHF [Hanford Environmental MARKS: Yes, I did. HUNGATE:Were you involved in discussions with them of human exposures that they were planning? Some of which I think they did. MARKS: I don’t recall their doing any, but ... HUNGATE:I ran across some old reports of Dag’s involvement with americium and plutonium and some of the things that they had very little data on in the early days. I just didn’t know whether you would be involved in that or not? MARKS: Well, at one point I was involved in an americium case where the individual had been exposed during the course of his work in the plant, and I participated in the follow-up of his case. That was not a deliberate experimental thing. HUNGATE:Was that the case where the resin column blew up? MARKS: I think so, yes. And then I was... HUNGATE:Let’s see. That happened after Dag was there. I think both Dr. Norwood and Dr. Fuqua had left HEHF at that time. I believe Breitenstein was the principal person in that treatment. When you were in Washington, you were working with, was it AEC, ERDA [Energy Research and Development Agency], or who was involved at that time? We went through a transition from AEC to ERDA to DOE [U.S. Department of Energy], I never could keep track of when one was the proper name or the other? MARKS: I was working with AEC initially, and then I believe it became ERDA and at the time I left DOE, it was converting to DOE. HUNGATE:What was the nature.of the work that you did back in DC Washington, D.C.]?

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MARKS: I worked in the biology/medical program, I’ve forgotten what it was called, Environment and Health Division, I think it was. I had contract responsibility for the statistics and epidemiology. So that was my role. HUNGATE:Did you interact with any of the staff relevant to planned human exposures or anything like that in discussions or.. .. MARKS: I don’t recall being part of any planning process with regard to that. HUNGATE:Do you recall, was there a planning process on that? MARKS: It was a local thing. HUNGATE:When you say local, it was originated out in the field, or wherever and then the information gradually filtered back to headquarters. Do you know, did headquarters ever put a check on those plans? MARKS: I don’t recall that there was any check on those plans during the time that I worked there. DOE only became involved in it later, after I was back at Battelle, but I don’t recall that we were involved in it at that time. HUNGATE:Was there a formal review of that kind of thing that you were aware of back at MARKS: I don’t recall any. HUNGATE:This was in the period that Jim Liverman was head of that group, was it? MARKS: It was, and I think there was someone before him, but I don’t recall who it was....I think Bill Burr may have headed it up at one point, but I couldn’t say. HUNGATE:Yes, the sequence of people, I can’t recall, either. MARKS: Now, I did get involved in the human subjects issue on one thing. The plutonium studies of people who were considered to be terminal, which has been ongoing for some time and during the time I was there, they weren’t providing the plutonium to people, but they were following up on it. This was an Inspector General’s review of the program, which was conducted out in various laboratories and universities, I’ve forgotten. And I was appointed to go with the Inspector General’s people out to the labs to get information and discuss it with people who were responsible at this time for maybe the follow-up. There was an Inspector General’s report on this, and I’ve forgotten what the nature of it was. I think it was generally supportive of the program, but I can’t say that for sure. That would be in the files somewhere. HUNGATE:Now, when you went out in the field, and you met with the various researchers, who were like yourself, pathologists, or whatever at the different hospitals that were involved in the study.. .

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I don’t think there were many pathologists, but people in various capacities would be responsible at this point for the study. I knew of that study, but very little about it. Do you remember about where those labs were that were involved in that work? I think there was one in the San Francisco area, I believe that Argonne may have been involved. I just don’t remember well. That information is available in the files I’m sure. But I really can’t tell you. There were I would guess, about 5 or 6 organizations that were conducting it. I vaguely recall maybe Rochester was involved, but I’m not sure of that either. Now when you say Inspector General, was that out of the Department of Justice or was that DOE’s Inspector. It was DOE’s Inspector General. While I was at Reed College, I was aware and actually involved, probably about 1950 or ’ 5 1, in some studies that were going on, and I know that there was another one going on in Portland involving the potential use of P-32 [phosphorus-32] to treat leukemia, and it’s my impression that there were lots of these somewhat casual [studies] and very little control going on in the early days. Do you have that similar kind of impression? I would guess that is the case. And the hospital had authority to go off on its own and... Yes, I think there was relatively little regulation at that time. I don’t know whether there were human subjects committees or not, but.. . Not that I am aware of. In the ones that I was involved, I was certainly not aware I think that was the case. Again, in most cases, they were. Certainly the one I was involved with-terminal cases-and that was the last straw effort so that they hoped to gain information, but also to help the patient as a part of the process. Yes, I don’t know how they would help the patient, but ... In the one I was involved with, the patient was deemed to be well toward death and I got Christmas cards for a number of years. It was very strange. This was the case with the plutonium experiments, if you want to call them that, the studies. There were some individuals who were considered to be terminal who lived on for a period of time. I think this was attributed less to beneficial effects of the nuclide than to misperception of the seriousness of their illness.

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HUNGATE: That certainly can happen. I have always felt that medicine is in practically all cases an experimental process in itself. MARKS: It is, absolutely. HUNGATE:Since we are talking a little bit about perceptions, I guess I should mention one of the conscious exposures of people on a massive scale, not as massive as nuclear testing, but on a fairly massive scale, that we were all involved with, and that’s the plan by the city of Richland to use its drinking water, taking it from the Columbia River downstream from the seven or eight reactors that were then dumping radioactivity into the river. Do you have any rememberence of that period when that decision was made, and attitudes toward the process. HUNGATE:It has always made a strong impression on my mind, because here the people chose to do that rather than sinking wells or other procedures for getting water. HUNGATE: It’s my speculation that one of your most traumatic episodes was when you came back from Washington, D.C.,to rejoin Battelle and then the Mancuso event was dumped into your lap, so to speak. Do you care to comment on that episode? MARKS: Actually I had responsibility for the Mancuso event in Washington and it was an unpleasant experience, but I don’t think I have any more comments to make on HUNGATE:I recognize that it had tended to be because I saw in the records that you had to testify back at Congress for various things to defend having taken over the MARKS: Yes, well, I was responsible initially for the contract management of it and what happened was that the advisory committee recommended that it not be pursued in this manner because there was a lack of faith in the way it was being done. Actually Mancuso was reluctant to publish anything, even in a temporary manner. HUNGATE: I recall. A number of us had commented that there was nothing coming out. MARKS: Right. As a consequence, the decision was made to terminate his contract, or to not renew it. It became an issue that he pursued vigorously and he got support from people who objected …