Retired depot workers are living history

This story was published Sun, Aug 15, 2004

By Jeannine Koranda
Herald Oregon bureau

HERMISTON - The gray-haired women who meet for breakfast and conversation twice a month don't spend much time debating the safety of their former workplace or speculating about what would happen to their town if there was an accident there.

The women who meet for breakfast on the second and fourth Saturday of the month at the Pheasant Cafe & Lounge in Hermiston used to work together at the Umatilla Chemical Depot before chemical weapons were brought there in the 1960s. Some worked at the depot until they retired. Today, they're in their 70s and 80s.

Although their former job site has been in the news a lot lately as it gets closer to destroying the chemical weapons stored there, it isn't usually a topic of conversation for the group.

"I don't talk to people about it unless they bring it up," said Helen Wilson of Hermiston. She worked recording the chemical weapons as they arrived at the depot.

Conversations tend to revolve around grandkids, children who have moved away and how friends are doing.

"Very often we tell funny stories and joke," said Norma Quick, who lives on a farm southwest of Hermiston. "We laugh a lot."

"We have a history," said Fay Moses of Hermiston.

On Friday, more history was made. The Umatilla Chemical Depot received approval to start incinerating the stores of 220,604 munitions and containers filled with 7.4 million pounds of deadly nerve and mustard agents.

Mustard agents stored at the depot date back to World War II. All the nerve agents were brought to the depot for storage between 1962 and 1969.

The first M55 rockets containing GB nerve agent are expected to be moved into the incineration facility Wednesday and the first rocket destroyed Thursday.

Wilson said the weapons should have been destroyed a long time ago, and pointed out there have been no major accidents at the site.

"A lot of people wish we didn't develop chemical weapons, but we have them," she said.

Quick said she doesn't worry about the chemicals stored there. "I worked with people in the clinic who worked with the toxins and they were never worried," she said.

The stockpile isn't a big deal for people who have lived in Hermiston for a long time, said Flora Bell of Hermiston.

"You know who expresses the most fears about this are the people in Portland," Quick said.

The breakfasts started in the 1970s when downsizing at the depot meant people weren't working together anymore.

"We just continue to do it for the camaraderie," Moses said.

"You think by now we would be sick of each other," said Linda Gilleese of Hermiston. Yet the breakfast meetings often last more than an hour, with people lingering to talk.

Although some in the group have moved away, like Dee Pardun of Chambersburg, Pa., the breakfasts remain a good way to catch up.

Pardun made sure she stopped by while she was in town visiting family. She dropped in with her sister, Helen Maronda of Kennewick, who also worked at the depot for a year.

Pardun said there is danger everywhere, pointing out that she lived near Three Mile Island in Pennsylvania.

Maronda said she didn't have any fear about what was going on at the depot.

"I work very hard at keeping everything in perspective," she said. "Fretting about it won't do anybody any good."

 

Copyright 2002 Tri-City Herald. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.