It is based on a shocking true story, where a series . Wilbur Tennant explained that he and his four siblings had run the cattle farm since their father abandoned them as children. When they bought half of the farm from Wilbur they began to use it for a landfill to store the toxins being . Up until about a decade ago, few in the public knew about C8, let alone its potential health effects, but DuPont allegedly knew its toxic effects for decades and purportedly failed to tell employees or the public, according to The Intercept. These chemicals are most harmful when ingested and consequently bioaccumulate, meaning they build up over time in the body (just as they build up in the environment). Because I was feeding her enough feed that she shoulda gained weight instead of losing weight. Recently, the cows had started charging, trying to kick him and butt him with their heads, as this one had before she died. Tennant wants to sue chemical giant . All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever. Published by Atria Books, an imprint of Simon & Schuster, Inc. The same year, DuPont found that water in one local district contained PFOA levels at three times that figure. By that point, 153 animals died had died grisly deaths on his property . It is cut from the same cloth as movies like 'Erin Brockovich' and 'A Civil Action'. Two of seven babies born to Teflon plant employees in 1981 had facial deformities similar to what 3M had found in newborn rats. It had paid for the 150 acres of land his great-grandfather had bought and for the two-story, four-room farmhouse pieced together from trees felled in the woods, dragged across fields, and raised by hand. "Hold on to something," Jim Tennant warned as he fired up his tractor. But the point I want to make, and make it real clear, he said, zooming in, thats the mouth of Dry Run.. But you just give me time. working in the garden and around the farm with his grandson . Tennant told him that DuPont had bought land from his family that was adjacent to his farm, for what the company had assured him would be a non-hazardous landfill, according to a letter Bilott later filed with the Environmental Protection Agency. wilbur tennant farm location. He died of . DuPont immediately removed all female workers from areas where they might come into contact with the chemical.". And the money came in handy, too, since Jim, a Washington Works employee, had for years suffered from flu-like symptoms and illnesses that baffled doctors, as outlined in a Delaware Online article from 2016. Other testing by 3M found the compounds in apples, bread, green beans and ground beef. He sliced open the chest cavity, pulled out a lung, and turned the camera back on. Wilbur Tennant shot this video on his property in the 1990's. Tennant was a farmer who sold part of his land in Parkersburg, West Virginia, to DuPont, for what the company had assured him would be a non-hazardous landfill. Performance cookies are used to understand and analyze the key performance indexes of the website which helps in delivering a better experience for the visitors. This cookie is used to manage the interaction with the online bots. A month before DuPonts letter about PFOA, the Minnesota-based conglomerate 3M announced it would stop making a chemical with a similar sounding name: perfluorooctane sulfonic acid or PFOS. Foam began appearing in a creek that meandered past the landfill before spilling into the Tennants pasture, he later testified in a court filing. Taking on the case of Wilbur Tennant (played by Bill Camp in the film), a West Virginian farmer whose land is contaminated from toxic run-off dumped near his premises by DuPont Company, Bilott (Ruffalo) quickly encounters the gargantuan machine of corporate disinformation, negligence, cover-up, and strong-arm tactics that allow the company to . Wilbur Tennant had become desperate. When DuPont settled that lawsuit in 2004, the company agreed to finance a study of PFOAs health effects. And the man who started it all, Wilbur Tennant, won't see that resolution. The chemical companies are appealing the decision. . Like the movie, Richs article portrays Bilott as an unassuming and understated man driven by an innate sense of decency. 3M and DuPont have argued in court and in public statements that neither chemical is harmful to people at typical levels of exposure. These emerging contaminants linger, breaking down only when incinerated at very high temperatures. In November 2019, the Washington Post hosted a podcast with Mark Ruffalo and Robert Bilott to discuss the film and the lawsuit. She had spent the summer in the hollow, drinking out of Dry Run until shed started to act strangely. VigLink sets this cookie to show users relevant advertisements and also limit the number of adverts that are shown to them. In April 2000, after 3M conducted tests and studies on a similar, sister chemical to C8 (PFOA) called PFOS, the company notified the Environmental Protection Agency it found that "even modest exposure could have devastating health effects" and started to phase out PFOS use, as well as PFOA, according to the Huffington Post. Analytical cookies are used to understand how visitors interact with the website. Photos by Focus Features and EPK. After the Tennants had been paid and Bilotts law firm collected its fees for representing them, he found himself coming back again and again to the piles of industry documents he had collected, urged on by the persistent Tennant. PFOA (C8) and PFOS were the long-chain, more commonly used substances in a larger group of more than 4,000 man-made chemicals called per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS). Patches of missing hair, discolorations in their . The film seems to imply that the fire might have been an arson attempt that hit the wrong house, though it doesnt suggest who might have lit it. And if it sounds familiar, it should. Bilott tries to communicate to Tennant that he "isn't that kind of environmental lawyer," yet Tennant's exasperated resilience strikes a chord with the compassionate . The substance is stable, persistent, and very difficult to break down. The campaign coincided with the release of the film "Dark Waters" starring Mark Ruffalo inspired by the true story of Bilott, who discovered a community had been dangerously exposed for decades to deadly chemicals. Maps, Driving Directions & Local Area Information He knew the folks at the DNR, because they gave him a special permit to hunt on his land out of season. LinkedIn sets the lidc cookie to facilitate data center selection. DuPont detected PFOA in the drinking water of communities near the Teflon plant. In 1998, corporate lawyer Robert Bilott ( Mark Ruffalo) is approached by Wilbur Tennant ( Bill Camp) a farmer from his hometown of Parkersburg, West Virginia. How would you like for your livestock to have to drink something like that? he asked his imagined audience. As in the movie, he at first had a cozy relationship with DuPont, though some of the details of the relationship in the movie are invented. But now it seemed they were ignoring him. Then, in 1998 Bilott received a phone call from Wilbur Tennant who lived on his farm in Parkersburg, West Virginia. DuPont's statement said the film "depict[s] wholly imagined events," calling implications of a cover up "inaccurate," and claimed that it "grossly misrepresents" what happened. In Minnesota, 3M paid an $850 million settlement after the states attorney general used the industry documents in a lawsuit demanding clean drinking water for communities near one of its manufacturing plants outside Minneapolis. While DuPont did also conduct walk-throughs and physical searches of the Tennants belongings, deeply alienating some of the familys renters, the movie depicts some of Tennants evidence going mysteriously missing. The pipe flowed out of a collection pond at the low end of a landfill. In the 1990s Wilbur began to notice weird deformities in his cows and some of them were even dying. Parkersburg is also home to the Tennant family, who, for nearly a century, have worked land that eventually grew to 700-plus acres and raised more than 200 head of cattle. Call him, they suggested. I dont understand them great big dark red places across there. In short, I was playing for the opposite team, Bilott recalled in his memoir about the lawsuit he ended up filing against DuPont and the explosive aftermath. The document, published in Environmental Health Perspectives, called on global scientists, manufacturers, and retailers to work together to limit the use of PFASs and develop safer alternatives. In less than two years he had lost at least one hundred calves and more than fifty cows. The campaign coincided with the release of the film "Dark Waters" starring Mark Ruffalo inspired by the true story of Bilott, who discovered a community had been dangerously exposed for decades to deadly chemicals. When the cattle on Wilbur Earl Tennants farm began to mysteriously fall ill and die, he suspected it wasnt what the animals were eatingit was what they were drinking. I dont recall him drinking, Deitzler says. . Science Friday is produced by the Science Friday Initiative, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization. He zoomed in. Tennant recounted to anyone who would listen that he'd lost about 100 calves and 50 cows over the years. New York, NY 10004. The unlikely hero was an Ohio-based corporate defense lawyer paid to protect chemical companies, just like the one the farmer suspected of foul play. The following is an excerpt of Exposure: Poisoned Water, Corporate Greed, and One Lawyers Twenty-Year Battle against DuPont by Robert Bilott and Tom Shroder. The problem, he thought, was not what they were eating but what they were drinking. This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. During manufacturing processes, PFAS chemicals are released into the air, soil, and water around industrial facilities, the EPA reports. From playing with computers to building networks: How the space for Black Software was made. But that's just the start. Facebook gives people the power to share and makes the world more open and connected. Wilbur's brother, Jim, was also employed as a laborer at the Washington Works plant, along with hundreds more who found steady work at the area's largest employer. This cow died about twenty, thirty minutes ago, Earl said. C8 is a "surfactant," a chemical compound that reduces surface tension. As one of Bilotts colleagues told the New York Times, To say that Rob Bilott is understated is an understatement. Its also true that Bilott did not have the same Ivy League pedigree of many of his colleagues at Taft, having been raised on Air Force bases across the continental United States and West Germany, and it was through these working-class connections that he was introduced to the Tennant family farm case. "He was doing for the Tennants what he would have done for any of his corporate clients pulling permits, studying land deeds and requesting from DuPont all documentation related to Dry Run Landfill but he could find no evidence that explained what was happening to the cattle," the New York Times wrote. And, like many Grisham novels, it's a tale worthy of the big screen. His cattle now drank from its pools. A group of citizens in West Virginia challenges a powerful corporation to be more environmentally responsible. just a dukes mix of everything. Until lately, the cattle always fattened up nicely on that, plus the corn he grew to finish them and a grain mix he bought from the feed store. Join Facebook to connect with Wilbur Tennant and others you may know. Next door to Tennant's farm was a landfill owned by E.I. He had stopped feeding his family venison from the deer he shot on his land. The farmer's name was Wilbur Earl Tennant. In the 1980s, Jim and his wife, Della, would sell acreage to DuPont for use as a landfill for scrap metal, according to the New York Times Magazine. Her calf, black and white, lay dead on its side in a circle of matted grass. They're in virtually everything we use, including stain-resistant fabric and carpets, nonstick cookware, water-repellent clothing, and firefighting foam. It was contaminated with high levels of PFOA. "As soon as you cut the skin loose, you get some of the foulest smells you've ever smelled," Jim Tennant told the Huffington Post. "If that's what it takes to get people the information they need and to protect people, we're willing to do it.". Theres been fifty-six cows thats been burnt just like this.. The problem had to be Dry Run, he thought. Slate is published by The Slate Group, a Graham Holdings Company. song that goes bum bum bum 2020. wilbur tennant farm locationconservation international ceo. He especially enjoyed hunting, working in the garden and around the farm with his grandson Josh and . Thats where theyre supposed to come down here and pull water samples, to see whats in that water. He pointed the camera at a stagnant pool of water flanked by knee-high grass. The West Virginia-based . DuPont responds with a study of the Tennant farm conducted with the Environmental Protection Agency (E.P.A) that . And theyre going to find out one of these days that somebodys tired of it.. Set by the GDPR Cookie Consent plugin, this cookie is used to record the user consent for the cookies in the "Advertisement" category . He toldThe Intercept in 2015 that it bubbled up out of glass containers and "was everywhere." Robert Bilott isn't done. Washington, West Virginia. Bilott helped companies comply with new environmental regulations established by the Superfund legislation and became an expert at the chemistry of pollutants, according to the New York Times Magazine. At the end of the movie, I had a revelation. Thats Hollywood, I guess. (Bilott has not yet responded to my email and telephone inquiries about whether he has ever enjoyed a celebratory Mai Tai or any other tropical, rum-based cocktail.). Wilbur Tennant's brother Jim really was a DuPont employee plagued with a serious ailment his doctors could not diagnose, and the chemical company did buy his 66 acres of the family's 600-some . These cookies do not allow the tracking of navigation on other websites and the data collected is not combined or shared with third parties. Wilbur Tennant. Earl retired from the WV Department of Highways as an equipment operator. Thats very unusual. A creek connects the landfill and the fields of Tennant's farm. Dry Run used to flow gin clear. It smelled rotten. Their quest for justice wound its way through the American judicial system for nearly two decades, unearthing long-hidden deeds which, some reports say, are akin to those perpetrated by big tobacco on the public. Just because there really is something in the water doesnt mean you cant also be paranoid. Photo illustration by Slate. They were green like the foamy water that ran out of a pipe from the nearby Dry Run Landfill and into the creek from which the Tennant cattle drank. DuPont de Nemours & Co., used to dump chemical waste from the company's . This cookie is used for storing country code selected from country selector. As unbelievable as it may sound, DuPont really did, in the 1960s, offer some of its staff Teflon-laced cigarettes as a human experiment into the potential side effects of the PFOA-produced nonstick material, as the movie recounts. Calf born dead. Earl loved his cows, and the cows loved Earl. Dark Waters tells the true story of American farmer Wilbur Tennant who calls on lawyer Rob Bilott (Mark Ruffalo) to help him sue a chemical company Credit: Focus Features. In 2005, the company agreed to fund studies on the health effects of C8. This cookie is installed by Google Universal Analytics to restrain request rate and thus limit the collection of data on high traffic sites. Did they think he would just sit by? For example, New Hampshire sued 3M and DuPont, along with a handful of companies that make firefighting foam containing PFAS. A videotape Tennant shot with a VHS camcorder shows emaciated cows with tumors on their hides. So, the couple sold about 60 acres to DuPont. The cookie is used to store and identify a users' unique session ID for the purpose of managing user session on the website. He walked there every day to count heads and check fences. Bilott found studies that potentially linked PFOA with a variety of cancers, birth defects, and illnesses. . A thicker foam gathered in eddies, trembling like egg whites whipped into stiff peaks so high they sometimes blew off on a breeze. In 1973 she [took] him to the cattle farm belonging to the Tennants' neighbors, the Grahams, with whom White was friendly. In his research, Bilott had come across a DuPont letter that referred to a chemical known as . ATSDR/CDC also notes that more studies need to be done in the area of health effects, particularly on shorter-chain substances. In the spring, he would run and catch the calves so his daughters could pet them. By the late 1990s, West Virginia farmer Wilbur Tennant was at his wits end. They just turn their back and walk on. . This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. Thank you for helping us continue making science fun for everyone. Bilott, with begrudging support of his firm (Tim Robbins plays his boss), confirms Wilbur's worst fears: the local DuPont plant has been dumping toxic waste on land next to the Tennant farm. Her eyes were sunk deep in her head. Dry Run was less than a miles walk from the home place, across Lee Creek, through an open field, and along a pair of tire tracks. DuPont initially refused, but a court order ultimately forced them to turn over what amounted to more than 100,000 pages, some dating back 50 years. Then he wrote a 19-page letter, attached some of the industry documents and mailed the package to officials at the EPA and the Department of Justice. DuPont appeared to be concerned enough about PFOA that the company tested employees at the Teflon plant and found the chemical in their blood, the letter to the EPA revealed. It wasnt just his cattle dying. The suit alleges negligence claiming the chemicals contaminated the state's natural resources, according to New Hampshire Public Radio. Late in the film, a disillusioned Bilott (Mark Ruffalo), up against a wall, imagines that the multinational corporation, the likes of which he once defended, might be setting him up to be a cautionary tale for all their would-be litigants: Look, everybody, even he cant crack the maze, Bilott says, and hes helped build it.. Robert Bilott is a partner at Taft, Stettinius & Hollister LLP in Cincinnati, Ohio. These "forever chemicals" are an emerging global health and environmental issue. He was 7 years old. Shes poor as a whippoorwill. In 1998, a farmer named Wilbur Earl Tennant knocked on the door of a lawyer named Robert Bi-lott on the grounds that the vegetation structure of the land he owned was impaired, the cattle he was breeding were affected and the only responsible was the factory located next to the river, ow-ning a wasteland adjacent to his property. November 25, 2019 12:03 PM EST. He died of cancer in 2009; he was 67. Over the decades they steadily acquired land and cattle, until 200 cows roamed more than 600 hilly acres. Tennant is convinced that a landfill operated by the DuPont company upstream from his farm is the cause of the continuing maladies suffered by his cattle and his family. It kicked and thumped and wallered around there like you wouldnt believe.. The use of these cookies is strictly limited to measuring the site's audience. However, the company didn't tell employees or regulators and ended the study, the Huffington Post reports. Its head was tipped back at an awkward angle. The cattle farmer stood at the edge of a creek that cut through a sun-dappled hollow. oh, two-thirds bigger than it should be., The kidneys, too, looked abnormal. The cookie is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Analytics". Nearly 70,000 people participated. Tennant was a farmer who sold part of his land in Parkersburg, West Virginia, to DuPont, for Wilbur Tennant vs. DuPont on Vimeo (He later would be played by actor Mark Ruffalo in the 2019 film Dark Waters.). This cookie is native to PHP applications. They had seven cows then. It was small and ephemeral, fed by the rains that gathered in the creases of the ancient mountains that rumpled West Virginia and gave it those misty blue, almost-heaven vistas. Dont understand that at all. When she returned to work at DuPont, Bailey learned about a study by 3M (the manufacturer of C8) that found similar deformities in unborn rats exposed to the chemical, according to the Huffington Post. The goal of the merger was to combine two businesses that dabbled in . Both companies denied any wrongdoing. Its dumping pits were unlined, designed for the disposal of nonhazardous wasteoffice paper and everyday trash. DuPonts lawyers had a different perspective on the incident, however, writing in an email, It is a federal offense to threaten violence against an aircraft carrying passengers and Please be advised that the helicopter pilot has indicated that he will pursue todays incident with federal authorities.. As luck would have it, the company bought 66 acres from one of their employees, Wilbur Tennant. . On August 31st of 2017, E. I. Dupont de Nemours Company and the Dow Chemical Company merged as part of a $130 billion merger. Around here, that economic engine was DuPont, known for innovations like nylon, Tyvek, and Teflon.