By Maegan Murray, ���سԹ�

RICHLAND, Wash. – The authors of a new book focusing on the beginnings of the Hanford Site will hold a public presentation from 5 p.m. – 6:30 p.m. Tuesday, Dec. 4, in the East Auditorium at Washington State University Tri-Cities.

Authors Robert Bauman, Robert Franklin, David W. Harvey and Laura Arata recently released the book, “Nowhere to Remember: Hanford, White Bluffs and Richland to 1943,” which chronicles the early days of pre- and post-Hanford towns and the people that were removed to make way for the Hanford Site.

“The Hanford Site has a very interesting and sometimes even unsettling history, but it is important to tell all aspects of that story,” Franklin said. “This book focuses on the origin of that story and the people who were involved in those early towns. It’s a fascinating look into an early story that many people may not know.”

The Hanford Site is home to the world’s first full-scale plutonium production reactor, which was built over the span of a one-year period during World War II in secret. Plutonium produced at the site was used in the first nuclear bomb, which was tested at the Trinity Site in New Mexico, as well as in the Fat Man bomb that was detonated over Nagasaki, Japan. During the Cold War, the site expanded to include nine nuclear reactors and five large plutonium processing facilities, which produced plutonium for the U.S. nuclear arsenal. The facility is now being decommissioned and resides as one of the largest nuclear clean-up projects in the world. It is also the home of a commercial nuclear power plant known as the Columbia Generating Station.

In the early stages of the Hanford Site, families were relocated or were required to leave their place of residence in the Hanford area.

“All residents of the towns of White Bluffs and Hanford, and many of the residents of Richland, were required to move,” Bauman said.

The book is the first in a series known as the Hanford Histories that will be published by WSU Press, in association with ���سԹ�’ Hanford History Project. Other volumes are currently in the works, of which some of the topics will focus on science and the environment, race and diversity, constructing Hanford, the Manhattan Project and its legacies and an illustrated history of Hanford.

Copies of “Nowhere to Remember: Hanford, White Bluffs and Richland to 1943” may be purchased at the event with cash or check for $25. Or, they may be purchased online at the website. Authors will also be available both before and after the presentation to sign copies.

RICHLAND, Wash. – Washington State University Tri-Cities launched its first book for a new series known as the Hanford Histories during a launch event at the Manhattan Project National Historical Park Interim Visitors’ Center, located at 2000 Logston Blvd in Richland.

During the launch, ���سԹ� history professor Bob Bauman and Robert Franklin, ���سԹ� Hanford History Project archivist and oral historian, talked about their book, “Nowhere to Remember: Hanford, White Bluffs and Richland to 1943.” The event also featured representatives of the Hanford History Project and Hanford Histories series partner and publisher WSU Press.

“The first volume in the Hanford Histories series uses oral history interviews conducted as part of the Hanford Oral History Project to tell the story of the towns of Hanford, White Bluffs and Richland in the years before World War II,” Bauman said. “Many people in the region know about the Hanford Site, but not many know about the towns and people that were removed to make way for Hanford. In many ways, those people and towns have been erased from history. This volume hopes to remedy that.”

Copies of the book are now available for purchase for $24.95 on the WSU Press website at .

Detailing the early days of pre- and post-Hanford

Franklin said the purpose of the book, as well as the series in general, is to examine different subjects and themes surrounding Hanford history through the voices of those who have lived it.

“Little could the residents of these communities imagine …. how radically their fates would diverge from their fellow frontiersmen with the arrival of government troops in 1943,” said Michael Mays, director of the Hanford History Project, in the preface for the book. “’Nowhere to Remember’ leans heavily on the oral histories that Hanford History Project and others have recovered over the years to recount a history that would otherwise very likely have vanished along with those displaced communities.”

Bauman said people represented in the first book tell fascinating stories of hardship, perseverance, community and displacement.

Hanford Histories as a book series

While the book is the first in the Hanford Histories series, other books will follow on Hanford, featuring subjects including science and the environment, race and diversity, constructing Hanford, the Manhattan Project and its legacies and an illustrated history of Hanford.

“Combining archival research and the narratives the Hanford Oral History Project has gathered since 2013, the books in the series balance the regional, national and international impacts of the Hanford Site,” Franklin said.

He said Hanford is often examined from the point of its environmental legacy, or as part of the much larger Manhattan Project or Cold War defense complex.

“These narratives often sacrifice detail and first-hand accounts for a wide scope,” he said. “It is our hope that by examining the history of Hanford through the words of former workers, residents of Richland and those affected by Hanford, that we can introduce the reader in a thoughtful and approachable way to this complex history.”