Column by Hal Walter
Conservation – April 2002 – Colorado Central Magazine
“Prepare to receive intense gamma radiation,” the figure on the aspen-lined trail calls out from ahead. “We’re coming up on the richest vein of thorium in the nation.”
My first instinct is to hold my breath. But as I look into the pit, where splintering timbers point to a dark hole, I open my mouth and the irradiated but familiar thin air rushes into my lungs. I run by this mine quite often on my regular runs around Bear Basin Ranch near my home in the Wet Mountains. What the hell — if thorium particles are good for Gary Ziegler to breathe, they must be good for me too.
