Dark Waters: Inspired By Courage - Dark Blue Journal It was to be incinerated or sent to chemical-waste facilities. death of 260 cattle in West Virginia - Fluoride Action Network Exposure: Poisoned Water, Corporate Greed, and One Lawyers Twenty-Year Battle against DuPont. These cookies help provide anonymized information on metrics the number of visitors, bounce rate, traffic source, etc. Similarly, DuPonts presence in the Ohio and West Virginia Chemical Valley regions really did resemble the company town vibe portrayed in Dark Waters, with citizens frequently too enthralled by the multinationals economic benefits to question its impact on their health and safety. 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. 0 Comments Comments How would you like for your livestock to have to drink something like that? he asked his imagined audience. 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. Tennants Farm Pond Dam (in Wood County, WV) - HomeTownLocator Two weeks after he filmed the foamy water, Earl aimed the camcorder at one of his cows. He often walked through the woods shirtless and shoeless, his trousers rolled up, and he moved with an agile strength built by a lifetime of doing things like lifting calves over fences. DuPont then really did proceed to turn that plot into a dumping ground for sludge that it knew to be toxic, going so far as to quietly conduct tests for perfluorooctanoic acid, or PFOA, in the nearby river and expressing concern for the health of the Tennants livestock in internal documents nearly a decade before they would be denying culpability and blaming the Tennants in court. Something is the matter right there. The spleen was thinner and whiter than any spleen he had come cross. In 1981 , 3M found that ingestion of . By the 1980s, DuPont had allegedly begun dumping PFOA waste into the Dry Creek Landfill, near the Tennant property. He knew his neighbors and his community was being poisoned, Bilott told the Post. At least thats what his family had been told thirteen years before by the company that had bought their land. November 25, 2019 12:03 PM EST. The True Story of 'Dark Waters': How Accurate are the Characters? - The Robert Bilott (born August 2, 1965) is an American environmental attorney from Cincinnati, Ohio.Bilott is known for the lawsuits against DuPont on behalf of plaintiffs injured by waste dumped in rural communities in West Virginia. It was really his dedication to bringing that out that really inspired me to try to find a way to address the bigger problem., Amazingly, the Pakula-esque paranoid thriller scene, in which Wilbur Tennant spots a low-level helicopter hovering ominously over his property, uses the scope of his hunting rifle to better examine the vehicle, and scares it off in the process, did in fact occur. Once this came to light, reports indicate, the Tennants settled their lawsuit against DuPont in August 2000, but the fight wasn't over. . When he noticed his cows were mysteriously dying, he filmed what was happening on the farm, and the toxic legacy of C8 - DuPont's Teflon chemical - was discovered. It stars Mark Ruffalo as Bilott, along with Anne Hathaway, Tim Robbins, Bill Camp, Victor Garber, Mare . The farmer, Wilbur Tennant of Parkersburg, W.Va., said that his cows were dying left and right. It wasnt his first. He sued DuPont again on behalf of thousands of people who lived near the Teflon plant and for decades had been exposed to PFOA through drinking water and air pollution. 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. This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. The West Virginia-based . LinkedIn sets this cookie to store performed actions on the website. Now, he was feeding them twice as much and watching them waste away. On the other side of his property line, Dry Run Landfill was filling up the little valley that had once belonged to his family. Did they think he would just sit by? 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. The Devil We Know on iTunes - Apple Despite internal debate, it declined to make the information public," the magazinenotes. It is based on a shocking true story, where a series . They concluded that 'the study was valid' and that 'the observed fetal eye defects were due to C8,' according to internal DuPont documents. Rob Bilott's Exposure is a real-life whodunit, a page-turning courtroom drama, a David-and-Goliath story of one man against an industrial colossus and a shocking expos of America's utterly broken environmental policy.You should also take this book personally - because the "exposure" of the title is yours. DuPont, Billot, Tennant and PFOA - vanessawilliams - Suffolk University wilbur tennant farm location. The substance is stable, persistent, and very difficult to break down. Shes poor as a whippoorwill. According to the New York Times Magazine, "By 1990, DuPont had dumped 7,100 tons of PFOA sludge into Dry Run Landfill. The cookie is set by the GDPR Cookie Consent plugin and is used to store whether or not user has consented to the use of cookies. And I burn them all. Nothing jumped out in page after page he reviewed, Bilott recalled. 3M and DuPont have argued in court and in public statements that neither chemical is harmful to people at typical levels of exposure. Tennant's farm is close to a newly DuPont-owned landfill. Deitzler suggests it would have been a historic first for no partners at a firm of Tafts size and corporate client base to express qualms about a class-action suit of this kind. Jim still calls it "the home place," although its windows are now boarded up and the outhouse is crumbling into the field. In another field, a grown cow lay dead. July 7, 1996 Washington, West Virginia. This cookie is set by the provider Akamai Bot Manager. VigLink sets this cookie to show users relevant advertisements and also limit the number of adverts that are shown to them. 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. Interview: Todd Haynes on - Slant Magazine Michael Hawthorne is a Pulitzer-finalist investigative reporter who focuses on the environment and public health for the Chicago Tribune. 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. Dead cows with mysterious bloody noses and green organs - The Sun This cookie, set by YouTube, registers a unique ID to store data on what videos from YouTube the user has seen. About 600 are in use today, according to the EPA. The chemical companies are appealing the decision. What's Fact and What's Fiction in Dark Waters - Slate Magazine His earlier efforts had all revealed unpleasant surprises: tumors, abnormal organs, unnatural smells. Bilott did marry a fellow lawyer, Sarah Barlage, who left her career defending corporations against workers compensation claims to raise their sons. There is about a teacup or so full of itits a real dark yeller. 'Dark Waters' is slated to release on November 22, 2019, and has Mark Ruffalo playing the role of a tenacious attorney, who takes the fight to a big chemical company. 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 Taft offices are in Cincinnati, Ohio. He believed that the DuPont chemical company, which until recently operated a site in Parkersburg that is more than 35 times the size of the Pentagon, was responsible. Excerpt from Exposure: Poisoned Water, Corporate Greed, and One Lawyers Twenty-Year Battle against DuPont. This cookie is associated with Django web development platform for python. These cookies ensure basic functionalities and security features of the website, anonymously. 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. Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. The suit alleges negligence claiming the chemicals contaminated the state's natural resources, according to New Hampshire Public Radio. Ken Wamsley spent nearly 40 years working at DuPont Washington Works plant, and some of that time, he measured levels of the chemical C8 (PFOA). And Im gonna cut her open and find out what caused her to die. 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. "The innards was bright green.". 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 smell was odd. The June 23, 2000, letter listed something in the landfill that didnt appear in the other documents or in Tafts chemical dictionaries. And, based on Centers for Disease Control data, PFAS chemicals were found the blood of 98 percent of people studied. Wilbur Tennant and his family had recently sold part of their farmland to a company and had no idea what would end up coming of it. I dont ever remember seeing that in there before., He cut out the heart and sliced it open. Wilbur Tennant is on Facebook. The local employer wanted to buy some of their property for a landfill for its Washington Works plant nearby, where it produces, among other things, Teflon, which contains the chemical C8. wilbur tennant farm location - HAZ Rental Center DuPont bought 66 acres of the Tennant's farm land from Wilbur Tennant's brother Jim and his wife Della [1]. But you just give me time. 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. The cookies is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Necessary". Dry spells shrank it to a necklace of pools that winked with silver minnows. While the character of the hand-wringing Taft lawyer James Ross, portrayed by The Good Places William Jackson Harper, seems to have been invented, along with the scene where Ross suggests that Bilotts class-action suit might read to the public as nothing more than a shakedown of an iconic American company, Bilott did tell the New York Times that he perceived that there were some What the hell are you doing? responses within the firm. These cookies will be stored in your browser only with your consent. All contents 2023 The Slate Group LLC. Jim Tennant and his wife, Della, sold DuPont a 66-acre tract of land that became part of the Dry Run Landfill. Next door to Tennant's farm was a landfill owned by E.I. They are everywhere. "Hold on to something," Jim Tennant warned as he fired up his tractor. Revelations by another chemical company gave Bilott leverage to go back into court and request more records from DuPont. R ob Bilott, a corporate lawyer-turned-environmental crusader, doesn't much care if he's made enemies over the years. Her eyes were sunk deep in her head. This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. Wilbur Earl Tennant was a cattle farmer in Parkersburg, Virginia, who was known to his family and friends as Earl. Hunting had been one of Earls greatest pleasures. Details of what DuPont allegedly knew and when came to light in pages and pages of documents, initially as part of the lawsuit Bilott filed against the company on behalf of Wilbur Tennant and then in more than 3,000 subsequent personal injury suits that have followed in the past two decades. This cookie is set by Facebook to display advertisements when either on Facebook or on a digital platform powered by Facebook advertising, after visiting the website. The PFAS and the Furious | Environmental Working Group "Mysterious wasting disease" and. They're in virtually everything we use, including stain-resistant fabric and carpets, nonstick cookware, water-repellent clothing, and firefighting foam. Maps, Driving Directions & Local Area Information "We have always and will continue to work with those in the scientific, not-for-profit and policy communities who demonstrate a serious and sincere desire to improve our health, our communities, and our planet.". And if it weren't for one West Virginia farmer, Wilbur Tennant, we still might not know much about them. All rights reserved. This cookie is used for load balancing purposes. The sp_landing is set by Spotify to implement audio content from Spotify on the website and also registers information on user interaction related to the audio content. Used to help protect the website against Cross-Site Request Forgery attacks. The Case Against DuPont - Type Investigations . YouTube sets this cookie to store the video preferences of the user using embedded YouTube video. Her calf, black and white, lay dead on its side in a circle of matted grass. The muscle looked fine, but a thin, yellow liquid gathered in the cavity where it once beat. In May 2015, a consortium of scientists across many disciplines released a document called the Madrid Statement. He believed that the DuPont chemical company, which until recently operated a site in Parkersburg that is more than 35 times the size of the Pentagon, was . He had stopped feeding his family venison from the deer he shot on his land. Some of the more surprising moments in the film were in fact real and confirmed by Bilott in his memoir about the case, like when the farmer Wilbur Tennant (Bill Camp), who brought the case to . Bilott's connection to Parkersburg dated back to his childhood, when he spent summers there visiting his grandmother, and her friend is the one who suggested to Wilbur Tennant that he call Bilott, an environmental lawyer at Cincinnati firm Taft Stettinius & Hollister, for help. The calf was engulfed in a black, humming mist. The Story of DuPont - 1 - ENVMAT In the 1990s Wilbur began to notice weird deformities in his cows and some of them were even dying. Todd Haynes new film Dark Waters wades into some of the most complicated topics in public health, chemistry, and the law to dramatize the story of environmental attorney Robert Bilott and his nearly two decades of civil actions against DuPont. This cookie is used to manage the interaction with the online bots. Earl had sought help, but no one would step up. 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. Tennant had a problem. They just turn their back and walk on, he told the camera. The Post read a statement from DuPont that reiterated the company's commitment to health and safety and protecting the environment: "Although DuPont does not make the chemicals in question, we have announced a series of commitments around our limited use of PFAS and are leading [the] industry in supporting federal legislation and science-based regulatory efforts to address these chemicals." Their innards smelled funny and were sometimes riddled with what looked to him like tumors. Wilbur Tennant shot this video on his property between 1995 and 1997. LinkedIn sets the lidc cookie to facilitate data center selection. 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 . Wilbur Tennant, played by Bill Camp in the film, showed Bilott videos and pictures he had taken of his cows foaming at the mouth and staggering in ways they hadn't before, with lesions covering . DuPont de Nemours & Co., used to dump chemical waste from the company's . It kicked and thumped and wallered around there like you wouldnt believe.. Even though he sold them to be finished and slaughtered for beef, he didnt have the heart to kill one himself, unless it had a broken leg and he needed to end its suffering. Home. A videotape Tennant shot with a VHS camcorder shows emaciated cows with tumors on their hides. A thicker foam gathered in eddies, trembling like egg whites whipped into stiff peaks so high they sometimes blew off on a breeze. This cookie is used to detect and defend when a client attempt to replay a cookie.This cookie manages the interaction with online bots and takes the appropriate actions. Wilbur Earl Tennant, 67 of New England passed away suddenly at his residence May 15, 2009. Leadership Lessons From Rob Bilott's 20 Year Battle For - Forbes Vacillating Wildly From Dispiriting to Exhilarating, A New Biopic Reduces One of Historys Greatest Writers to a Cottagecore Emo Girl, How Steven Spielbergs Autobiographical New Movie Rewrites His Story, The Lawyer Who Became DuPonts Worst Nightmare, He knew his neighbors and his community was being poisoned, commissioned a photographer to take aerial photos. Wilbur Earl Tennant - May 15, 2009 - Obituary - Tributes.com The farmers name was Wilbur Earl Tennant. Yes, DuPont is still in business, although it has struggled slightly to survive independently from time to time due to its poor public reputation. A downstate Illinois native, Hawthorne joined the Tribune in 2004 after covering the environment and state government in Ohio, Illinois and Florida. A corporate courtroom drama typically doesn't need extensive visual effects, but "Dark Waters" had a few key moments that could not be created practically. It looked, at most, a few days old. 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. Slate is published by The Slate Group, a Graham Holdings Company. Where they should have been smooth, they looked ropy, covered with ridges. LinkedIn sets this cookie for LinkedIn Ads ID syncing. The company turned this land into the unlined Dry Run Landfill. It was different from the regular dead-cow smells he had dealt with all his life. Foam began appearing in a creek that meandered past the landfill before spilling into the Tennants pasture, he later testified in a court filing. 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. During manufacturing processes, PFAS chemicals are released into the air, soil, and water around industrial facilities, the EPA reports. The Lawyer Who Became DuPont's Worst Nightmare - Brutal Proof Bryan Schutmaat for The New York Times. The sometimes contentious tenor of Bilotts relationship with Wilbur Tennant is also true to life. The True Story Behind Dark Waters Affects You - Refinery29 Even down near the tips of it. The West Virginia-based farmer was convinced a toxic river that ran into his farmland was to blame, since the animals' strange symptoms began when his brother sold some land to a chemical company to use as a landfill site a . Today, that site is home to Chemours Washington Works, a spinoff of DuPont that employs more than 600 people and produces a variety of products used in construction, aerospace, and household goods. The Teflon Toxin, Part 2: Wilbur Tennant vs. DuPontNot Yet Rated. Company officials told one of Tennants brothers in person and in writing they planned to turn it into a landfill for office garbage nothing hazardous. But friends knew the grandson of one of their neighbors had become an environmental lawyer in Cincinnati. Its just like that other calf up yonder, he said, panning over the matted grass. Given the fact that the events depicted on the Tennant cattle farm in Parkersburg, West Virginia, are Dark Waters' most important evidence, the filmmakers should have treated them with the utmost authenticity - to their credit, they did for the most part.Wilbur Tennant's brother Jim really was a DuPont employee who got sick with a disease the doctors couldn't diagnose; and the chemical . Then, in 1998 Bilott received a phone call from Wilbur Tennant who lived on his farm in Parkersburg, West Virginia. His hand shook as he pressed the zoom button, zeroing in on a stagnant pool. 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. He zoomed out and panned over to an industrial pipe spewing froth into the creek. 1998: Wilbur Tennant contacts Taft's and Hollisters' (Taft) lawyer, Robert Billot, to assist in his case against DuPont for dumping chemical waste into the river that his cows drink from, causing them severe health problems. The farmhouse stood at the foot of a sloping meadow that rose into a bald knob. Theres been fifty-six cows thats been burnt just like this.. He started the legal process in 1999 against DuPont by filing motions compelling it to turn over documents pertaining to hazardous materials used at the Washington Works plant near Parkersburg. Wilbur's brother, Jim, was also . Sloan Science & Film Twitter sets this cookie to integrate and share features for social media and also store information about how the user uses the website, for tracking and targeting. Yet to this day the companies deny responsibility, Bilott said in an interview. 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. Wilbur Tennants 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 familys 600-some-acre property in the 1980s.