By: Maggie Durnien

During the Cold War a rivalry developed among Communist and Non-Communist nations called the “Red Scare”. This rivalry led to experts producing and developing different types of nuclear weapons, which meant these new types needed to be tested.

The world began to worry that all this testing would produce medical harm, calling it a “fallout”. People were concerned that the radioactive particles would make them sick with cancer or other diseases. In 1963, the United States, Great Britain, and the Soviet Union joined forces and agreed on the Partial Ban Treaty in order to put some of this nuclear worry to rest. This treaty enforced an agreement to not test nuclear devices in the atmosphere or under water. The treaty does not prohibit underground testing due to the fact that it would be very difficult to specify that nations were not testing underground.

The United States developed Project Dribble to detect if nations could hide testing underground. Project Dribble included two Mississippi detonations; Salmon and Sterling. These detonations might have been released miles away from Hattiesburg, yet Hattiesburg was still affected greatly. While nuclear testing was a very hot topic back then, today its impact is not known by many, but still lingers in Hattiesburg waiting to be explored again.

 

United States History: Timeline: Cold War

Source: http://faculty.washington.edu/qtaylor/a_us_history/cold_war_timeline.htm

 

1945 Feb.       Yalta Conference

        May       World War II ends in Europe.

        Aug.       U.S. drops an atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan.

                       Potsdam Conference – Truman – Stalin and British divide up Europe

1946 Jan.     First East European Communist government set up in Albania

1947 Jan.        Communists seize power in Poland.

        March     Truman Doctrine announced.

1948 June       Berlin Airlift begins (ends May 19, 1949)

1949 April       North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) established.

        Aug.       Soviet Union explodes its first atomic bomb.

        Oct.       Communists win Chinese Civil War.

1950 June       U.S. and other U.N. members fight North Korean forces.

                        (the Korean War ends July 27, 1953)

1953 Aug.       U.S. sponsored coup overthrows Iranian government.

1954 June       U.S. sponsored coup overthrows Guatemalan government.

       Sept.       Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO) formed.

1955 May        Warsaw Pact formed.

       July         First Summit Meeting between President Dwight Eisenhower and Premier Nikita Khrushchev.

1956 Nov.        Red Army crushes the Hungarian Revolution.

1957 Oct.        Soviets launch first man-made satellite.

1959 Feb.        Fidel Castro becomes premier of Cuba, installs Communist government. 

1961 Apr.        Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba.

       Aug.        East Germany builds Berlin Wall.

1962 June       Sino-Soviet Conflict begins.

        Oct.       Cuban Missile Crisis.

1964 Oct.       China explodes its first atomic bomb.

1965 April      U.S. sends troops to the Dominican Republic.

        Aug.      U.S. commits combat troops to South Vietnam.

1968 Aug.      Soviet Red Army crushes Czech Uprising. 

1972 Feb.       President Richard Nixon visits China. 

1973 Sept.      U.S. supported coup overthrows Chilean government.

1975 Apr.       South Vietnam falls to Communist forces.

1976 Feb.       Soviet and Cuban forces help install Communist government in Angola.

1979 Jan.        U.S. and China establish diplomatic relations.

        Dec.       Soviet Red Army invades Afghanistan

1980 Aug.       Polish shipyard workers strike, Solidarity Union formed.

1983 Dec.       U.S. invades Grenada.

1985 Mar.      Mikhail Gorbachev becomes leader of the Soviet Union, the following year he declares glasnost and perestroika.

1989 May       Led by university students, over one million Chinese in Tiananmen Square demand reforms by the Chinese Communist government.

        Sept.     Solidarity forms the first post-war non-Communist government in Poland

        Oct.       Hungary declares a non-Communist government.

        Nov.       East Germany allows unrestricted migration to West Germany.

        Dec.       Berlin Wall is demolished.

1990 May       George Bush and Mikhail Gorbachev agree to the reunification of Germany in 1994

1991 Aug.       Hard-line Communists stage unsuccessful coup against Mikhail Gorbachev.

        Dec.       The Soviet Union is abolished.  Boris Yeltsin becomes President of Russia.

 

Project Dribble History Timeline

Source: http://mshistory.k12.ms.us/articles/293/nuclear-blasts-in-mississippi

1964 Atomic Energy Commission came to Mississippi and prepared the Tatum Salt Dome for Project Salmon.

1964  Sept 22nd.  Original set date for nuclear test (Salmon).

October 22nd Correct wind direction, 400 residents evacuated. Project Salmon was   tested.

• After the 1964 blasts, scientists reported all radiation had been contained underground
• Two months after the test, researchers drilled a hole into the void left by the blast to test the soil for radioactive material. It tested positive.

1966 Dec 3rd  The Project Sterling Blast.   

• Same test done on soil.

1969/1970   Project Miracle Play: Two explosions fueled by a mix of oxygen and methane.

1972 Buildings at the site were taken down and sent to the government’s Nevada Test Site.

2000 Government constructs a water pipeline to aid residents near the Tatum Salt Dome obtain drinking water from far away from the test site to help make the people less afraid of the drinking water.