On a Farther Shore (66 page)

One senior chemical executive complained
:
Ibid., November 22, 1959.

“wildlife and conservation groups”
:
Ibid.

Carson’s progress slowed
:
Carson to Paul Brooks, March 16, 1960, Beinecke.

who had expressed sympathy
:
Paul Brooks to Carson, March 18, 1960, Beinecke.

She said she was going to have surgery
:
Carson to Paul Brooks, March 21, 1960, Beinecke.

He told her that, unlike a historian
:
Paul Brooks to Carson, March 18, 1960, Beinecke.

Carson wrote back to say
:
Carson to Paul Brooks, March 23, 1960, Beinecke.

Carson also told Brooks
:
Ibid.

In my flounderings I keep asking
:
Ibid.

Carson said she also wanted to consider
:
Ibid.

A couple of weeks later
:
Carson to Marjorie Spock, April 12, 1960, Beinecke.

Carson, worried about Roger
:
Ibid.

Spock, desperate to help
:
Marjorie Spock to Carson, July 20, 1960; and September 29, 1960, Beinecke.

Carson tactfully avoided
:
Carson to Marjorie Spock, July 11, 1960; and January 4, 1961, Beinecke.

Paul Brooks, who apparently did not know
:
Paul Brooks to Carson, March 29, 1960, Beinecke.

Weak and in pain
:
Carson to Marjorie Spock, July 1, 1960, and Carson to Paul Brooks, June 1, 1960, Beinecke. Carson told Brooks her recovery was progressing but that her doctors had told her it would be midsummer before she regained full strength.

She and Brooks arranged for him
:
Paul Brooks to Carson, July 27, 1960, Beinecke.

In September she offered
:
Carson to Paul Brooks, September 5, 1960, Beinecke.

Brooks wrote back and told Carson
:
Paul Brooks to Carson, September 13, 1960, Beinecke.

When Marie Rodell heard about it
:
Marie Rodell to Carson, December 2, 1960, Beinecke.

in his dissenting opinion
:
“Dissenting Opinion, March 28, 1960, of Mr. Justice Douglas, Upon the Denial of Petition for Writ of Certiorari to the United States Court of Appeals, Second Circuit,” Supreme Court of the United States, October Term, 662;
Robert Cushman Murphy et al. v. Butler et al
., Beinecke.

During the past 15 years
:
Ibid.

Based on her latest
:
Paul Brooks to Carson, November 10, 1960, Beinecke.

Carson said she would come up
:
Carson to Paul Brooks, November 27, 1960, Beinecke.

But at the last minute she canceled
:
Paul Brooks to Carson, December 6, 1960, Beinecke.

Carson had found a swelling
:
Lear,
Rachel Carson
, p. 378.

She told Dorothy Freeman there was
:
Carson to Dorothy Freeman, November 25, 1960, Muskie.

“even though I asked directly”
:
Carson to Paul Brooks, December 27, 1960, quoted in Brooks,
House of Life
, p. 265.

Carson consulted with Dr. George “Barney” Crile, Jr.
:
Ibid., and Lear,
Rachel Carson
, pp. 378–79.

She wrote a letter to Dorothy
:
Carson to Dorothy Freeman, December 14, 1960, Muskie.

Carson relayed this news
:
Dorothy Freeman to Carson, December 16, 1960, Muskie.

She told Carson it would be so easy
:
Dorothy Freeman to Carson, December 16, 1960, Muskie.

In January 1961, the radiation treatments
:
Carson to Dorothy Freeman, January 4, 1960, Muskie.

The mass in her chest seemed to be
:
Ibid., January 3, 1960, Muskie.

On a cold late afternoon
:
Dorothy Freeman to Carson, January 31, 1961, Muskie.

In mid-January 1961
:
Carson to Paul Brooks, February 10, 1961, and March 25, 1961, Beinecke.

She kept up a brave mood
:
Carson to Dorothy Freeman, February 12, 1961, Muskie.

She told Paul Brooks she hated
:
Carson to Paul Brooks, March 25, 1961, Beinecke.

In May 1961, Marie Rodell visited Carson
:
Marie Rodell to Paul Brooks, May 23, 1961, Beinecke.

Carson now planned a total of
:
Ibid.

Brooks, elated at this
:
Paul Brooks to Carson, May 25, 1961, Beinecke.

Carson said she was eager
:
Carson to Paul Brooks, June 5, 1961, Beinecke.

In June 1961, after he’d seen Carson
:
Memo from Paul Brooks to Lovell Thompson, June 23, 1961, Beinecke.

in July the publisher sent
:
Katharine Bernard to Carson, July 6, 1961, Beinecke. Bernard worked at Houghton Mifflin.

She thought the Darlings’ drawings were
:
Carson to Katharine Bernard, July 14, 1961, Beinecke.

Both Brooks and Lovell Thompson thought
:
Memo from Paul Brooks to Lovell Thompson, September 15, 1961, Beinecke. Brooks told Thompson he thought Carson was wrong about the Darlings. Thompson scrawled his concurrence on the bottom of Brooks’s memo and sent it back.

Olaus Murie, a prominent naturalist
:
Olaus Murie to Carson, January 11, 1962, Beinecke.

But in the fall of 1961
:
Carson to Frank Egler, September 14, 1961, Beinecke.

Chastened, Egler wrote back
:
Frank Egler to Carson, September 20, 1961, Beinecke.

Still, Carson had enough confidence
:
Carson to Frank Egler, January 17, 1962, Beinecke.

Eight days later Carson was floored
:
Frank Egler to Carson, January 25, 1962, Beinecke.

She told Egler she would
:
Carson to Frank Egler, January 29, 1962, Beinecke.

Although he thought she offered
:
George Crile to Carson, January 30, 1962, Beinecke.

In the spring of 1961
:
Carson to Malcolm Hargraves, March 31, 1961, Beinecke.

Hargraves concurred with
:
Malcolm Hargraves to Carson, April 7, 1961, Beinecke.

In October, Carson wrote to Brooks
:
Carson to Paul Brooks, October 6, 1961, Beinecke.

Brooks patiently asked her
:
Paul Brooks to Carson, October 9, 1961, Beinecke.

In late October, Rodell told Brooks
:
Marie Rodell to Paul Brooks, October 24, 1961, Beinecke.

A few days later
:
Paul Brooks to Carson, October 27, 1961, Beinecke.

Brooks privately told Rodell
:
Paul Brooks to Marie Rodell, October 30, 1961, Beinecke.

One evening toward the end
:
Carson to Dorothy Freeman, January 23, 1962, Muskie.

issue of pesticide use into “literature”
:
Carson to Dorothy Freeman, January 23, 1962, Muskie. Shawn backed up his assessment with a contract that was to pay Carson $25,000 for a “multi-part long fact piece” on insecticides. This was increased to $28,000 when the
New Yorker
ended up serializing more of the book than anticipated (internal memos from the records of the
New Yorker
, February 12 and August 13, 1962, Manuscripts and Archives Division, New York Public Library).

Carson told Brooks this felt almost
:
Brooks,
House of Life
, p. 270.

On April 3, Brooks wrote her
:
Paul Brooks to Carson, April 3, 1962, Beinecke.

Marie Rodell asked Brooks
:
Marie Rodell to Paul Brooks, February 16, 1962, Beinecke.

In a rare moment of
:
Memo from Anne Ford to Paul Brooks, February 23, 1962, Beinecke. Brooks’s advice to send Diamond a copy of the book was handwritten across the bottom of the memo and returned to Ford.

In early April, Carson outlined
:
Carson to Paul Brooks, April 6, 1962, Beinecke.

chemical pesticides with “broad lethal powers”
:
Carson,
Silent Spring
, p. 162.

Houghton Mifflin was nervous about
:
Anne Ford to Marie Rodell, April 13, 1962, Beinecke.

Marie Rodell pooh-poohed these worries
:
Marie Rodell to Anne Ford, April 20, 1962, Beinecke.

As Marie Rodell reminded
:
Marie Rodell to Anne Ford, April 6, 1962, Beinecke.

In late April 1962, Paul Brooks asked
:
Memo from Diane Davin to Anne Ford, April 27, 1962, Beinecke. Davin worked at Houghton Mifflin.

She said she could still work
:
Carson to Dorothy Freeman, March 28, 1962, Muskie.

new mass in her armpit
:
Ibid., April 10, 1962, Muskie.

Among the attendees was
:
Ibid., May 20, 1962, Muskie.

A number of people had been
:
Ibid.

There was a strange stillness
:
Carson,
Silent Spring
, p. 2. For simplicity, I am citing the book, as everything published in the
New Yorker
is found in it, but not vice versa.

When Dr. Albert Schweitzer wrote
:
John F. Kennedy to Dr. Albert Schweitzer, June 6, 1962, JFK Library.

The latest round of tests
: New York Times
, June 1, 1963.

But fallout from Soviet testing
:
Draft Presidential Statement, n.d., JFK Library.

“We cannot say with certainty”
:
Ibid.

President Kennedy’s science adviser
:
Memo from Jerome Wiesner to the President, June 26, 1962, JFK Library. Science adviser Wiesner would soon be tapped to head Kennedy’s special commission looking into the use of pesticides, making him the government’s point man on the twin environmental menaces of the time.

Meanwhile, the administration requested
:
Memo from Jerome Wiesner to the President, August 9, 1962, JFK Library.

In mid-July 1962, Secretary of Agriculture
:
Memo from Orville Freeman to Bob Lewis, July 18, 1962, JFK Library. Like Wiesner, Freeman would become embroiled in the controversies around nuclear fallout and pesticides that summer.

A month later, having been appointed to
:
Memo from Orville Freeman to the President, August 21, 1962, JFK Library. The subject of milk contamination was only one of several subjects addressed in this regular report to President Kennedy.

Freeman was briefed on this angle
:
Memo from Walter Mondale et al. to Orville Freeman, August 18, 1962, JFK Library.

By November 1962
:
Memo from Samuel Botsford to Pierre Salinger, November 23, 1962, JFK Library. Botsford was acting director of public information at the U.S. Public Health Service. Salinger was President Kennedy’s press secretary.

The most alarming of all man’s assaults
:
Carson,
Silent Spring
, p. 6.

The Michigan Department of Agriculture
:
C. A. Boyer to Carson, July 11, 1962, records of the
New Yorker
, Manuscripts and Archives Division, New York Public Library. Boyer was in the Plant Industry Division of the Michigan Department of Agriculture.

In a sarcastic letter
:
Ibid.

One salty citizen
:
Henry J. Davidson to the editor of the
New Yorker
, n.d., ca. 1962, Beinecke. Attempting to gauge the overall reaction contained within the flood of mail prompted by the articles, the staff at the
New Yorker
counted up the letters on both sides and determined that the mail was running a little better than fourteen to one in favor of Carson (editorial department tracking memo, 1962, records of the
New Yorker
, Manuscripts and Archives Division, New York Public Library).

Another angry letter writer
:
Austin W. Merrill, Jr., to the editor of the
New Yorker
, July 17, 1962, Beinecke.

“Who would want to live”
:
Carson,
Silent Spring
, p. 12.

“Yet such a world is pressed”
:
Ibid.

“It is not my contention that”
:
Ibid.

In 1958, Congress passed
:
Shah,
Fever
, p. 207.

The early years of the
:
Ibid., pp. 207–8.

One irate reader wrote
:
P. Rothberg to the editor of the
New Yorker
, June 18, 1962, records of the
New Yorker
, Manuscripts and Archives Division, New York Public Library.

This, Carson wrote
:
Carson,
Silent Spring
, p. 266.