June 2026: I stumbled on the Denver Public Library web page Dr. Carl J. Johnson (1929-1988) when learning about Johnson’s work in Utah. I objected to the manifestly biased account of someone who is effectively the patron saint of downwinders, both around Rocky Flats and the Nevada Test Site. I was appalled, especially since this page was ostensibly targeted toward children. There were factual errors, such as noted in red below.
Within a year, Dr. Johnson became aware of horses in the area that had been contaminated with radioactive thorium.[Thorium is the most common natural radioactive element, accounting for about 50% of soil radiation dose along the Front Range.] This led him to collect samples of soil near the plant to test for radioactive materials. The results of his study, completed in 1977, showed high levels of radioactive cesium to the east and west of the plant. [137Cs is a fission byproduct, not from Rocky Flats. What were high levels? If Johnson data were reliable, little to no windblown contamination would be found west of the plant. Almost definitely from fallout–-measured levels in Rocky Flats soil are higher than for Pu.]
It culminated in the statement,
Update: In August of 2019, high levels of plutonium were found in the soil just outside the plant near 96th Avenue and Indiana Street. Further testing is ongoing.” There has been no plant since 2005; Pad 903 was at least 2 miles from the location specified, there are no citations to the literature or what might be meant by ‘high levels’.
How is such an addendum part of what is ostensibly a biography for children of someone who died in 1988? Nope, this entire document is an endorsement of the “politically correct” view on Rocky Flats. The interesting question is why its author Alejandro Hernandez felt it was appropriate to adopt this viewpoint and make it public.
As I told the Library,
As Denver Library staff know, the subject of Rocky Flats safety might appear to be an ongoing topic of debate based on popular media. In fact, there are two camps. In one are physical scientists and epidemiologists, some of whom published on the subject in the 1980s through about 2005, together with credentialed experts at the Department of Energy and (to a lesser extent), the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment. In the second camp are `downwinders’ and anti-nuclear groups who reject claims of safety from the Department of Energy and CDPHE based (not surprisingly) on the claims of Carl Johnson himself.
The Library owes to those who use its physical and online collections at least acknowledgement of both
sides, and a statement under all circumstances about the provenance of library documents.
My credentials for urging the Library to correct its entry on Dr. Carl Johnson are attached as a PDF. (I
maintain the website rockyflatsneighbors.org, which is firmly in the science camp.)
Downwinders resemble anti-vaxxers in several key respects: (i) they generally reject findings of the
peer-reviewed scientific literature; (ii) their sources of information are a hermetic system; (iii) their
spokesmen generally lack scientific credentials of any sort. To publish an overview of the life of Carl
Johnson written with their existing bias is roughly equivalent to a review of the life of Andrew
Wakefield, M.D. (author of the theory that vaccination causes autism) written by an anti-vaxxer. I’m
sure this is not the intent of a public institution.
I perceive the Library as having two choices:
(1) Correct the obvious errors already specified in the Word Bank and leave the existing document
intact (but explicitly specify the authorship and the date of the original entry) with a prominent link to
an alternative view of his career (attached) within the Library’s online holdings.
(2) Determine the validity of claims made in each document and reject the one which is contrary to the
published peer-reviewed scientific literature.Naturally the first choice requires the least intervention on the part of very busy Library staff.
The documents
- The letter I wrote to the Denver Public Library.
- The suggested additional document comparing the Library account with the verbatim Colorado Supreme Court transcript concerning Johnson’s 1981 firing as director of Jefferson County Public Health. This documents the scientific findings about Johnson’s Rocky Flats findings and additional sloppy epidemiology carried out in Utah after his firing.