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1939Ìý— Albert Einstein urges President Franklin D. Roosevelt to secure a reliable source of uranium and speed up experimental work on nuclear energy, which he says can produce “vast amounts of power.â€� Einstein adds, “It is conceivableÌý— though much less certainÌý— that extremely powerful bombs of a new type may thus be constructed.â€�

1941-1945Ìý— produces TNT and DNT under contract at the government-owned Weldon Spring Ordnance Works — a 17,232-acre facility near Weldon Spring in St. Charles County — as part of the World War II defense effort. The TNT and DNT produced there are used in 6-inch (155mm) howitzers, 2.4-inch (60mm) explosive shells for M2 Mortars, the 36-inch (914mm) caliber mortar (nicknamed Little David), and the Mk 2 hand grenade.

1942 — Mallinckrodt Chemical Works begins processing uranium ore at its downtown St. Louis factory, 65 Destrehan Street, for the Manhattan Engineer District (the Manhattan Project) to make the first atomic bomb. , chairman of the company, agreed to undertake the work after he is asked by atomic physicist , a key figure in the Manhattan Project and later chancellor of Washington University.

1945Ìý— The federal government transfers ownership of the Weldon Spring Ordnance Works site to the State of Missouri for what would become the August A. Busch Memorial Conservation Area. Another portion of land went to the University of Missouri for agricultural studies (later transferred to the state for the Weldon Spring Conservation Area). Additional parcels go to St. Charles County and the Francis Howell School District. The Army retains what remained of the property for use as a training area.

1946 — U.S. government acquires a 21.74-acre property near the City of St. Louis-owned airport, near the Wabash Railroad and Coldwater Creek, and begins dumping radioactive wastes there. Mallinckrodt “officials� and “security officers� that the stored materials were “not radio-active and not dangerous.� The site would later be known as the St. Louis Airport Site, or SLAPS.

1948-1952 — Mallinckrodt decontaminates two plants in its north downtown St. Louis plant, trucking much of the waste and debris to the airport site.

1953Ìý— spilled onto U.S. Highway 66, today’s Dunn Road, two miles north of the airport, after a truck overturned into a ditch. The driver was hauling the waste from Mallinckrodt’s downtown plant to the airport. “The dirt was not dangerous, it was pointed out,â€� the newspaper reported, and volunteer firefighters washed it from the road.

1954Ìý— Sixty tons of captured Japanese uranium wastes are brought to the St. Louis airport site.

1955Ìý— The Army transfers approximately 200 acres of the former Weldon Spring Ordnance Works property to the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission for construction of the .

1957 — Mallinckrodt, under contract to the Atomic Energy Commission, moves uranium processing from its north downtown St. Louis plant to Weldon Spring. The plant processes uranium-ore concentrates and a small amount of thorium between 1957 and 1966. Waste generated during these operations was stored at the Weldon Spring Site in four open-air lagoons called raffinate pits.Ìý

1958-1966 — General Steel Castings Corp. in Granite City, under purchase orders from Mallinckrodt Chemical Works, X-rays uranium ingots in the Betatron Building to detect metallurgical flaws. This work was performed for the Atomic Energy Commission. When the work was concluded, the site was remediated. After it was surveyed again in 1989, it was remediated again.

1958-1962 — Mallinckrodt contracts with Dow Metal Products, a division of Dow Chemical Co., to straighten some uranium rods at Dow’s plant in Madison, Illinois.

1965 — In a survey of the airport site, the Atomic Energy Commission finds about 121,000 tons of uranium refinery residues and contaminated material.

1966 — . The Atomic Energy Commission demolishes the buildings on the airport site and buries them. Sixty truckloads of scrap metal and a contaminated vehicle are buried on the property and covered by 1 to 3 feet of clean fill material. Continental Mining and Milling Co. buys some residues to try to recover more uranium. The company moves the waste to 9200 Latty Avenue — a site later known as the Hazelwood Interim Storage Site, or HISS — for storage and shipment to the Cotter Corp. in Cañon City, Colorado.

1966-1969 — After foreclosure, Cotter ends up owning property and buys the rest of the residues. It dries and ships some tailings to Cañon City. Federal authorities say improper handling by Cotter pollutes north St. Louis County roads.

1973 — B&K Construction, a contractor for Cotter Corp., mixes about 8,700 tons of leached barium sulfate containing a low concentration of uranium with about 39,000 tons of dirt at the Latty Avenue site and dumps it at West Lake Landfill in Bridgeton. The Atomic Energy Commission conveys the SLAPS property to the St. Louis Airport Authority.

1976 — . In a report completed in early 1977, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission investigators find neither West Lake Landfill or the Latty Avenue site “presents an immediate direct radiation health hazard to the public.�

1976-1978 — Radiological investigation of both the airport and Latty Avenue sites finds contamination at both, along with elevated radionuclide concentrations north of the site in ditches along McDonnell Boulevard. The ditches are designated for remedial action under the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’  (FUSRAP), a program created in 1974 to clean up sites contaminated by the nation’s early atomic energy program.Ìý

1977 — The federal government promises to clean up nuclear pollution around the nation. Congress sets up various agencies to do the job, with the cleanup assignment eventually going to the newly created U.S. Department of Energy.

1979 — Jarboe Realty, owner of the Latty Avenue site, moves 13,000 cubic yards from the western half of the site into storage on the eastern half. Jarboe builds a manufacturing facility for Futura Coatings Inc. on the western portion.

1984 — The Department of Energy performs “remedial actions� at Latty Avenue, creating 14,000 cubic yards of additional waste to be stored onsite. The Department of Energy is directed by Congress to reacquire the airport property and use it as a permanent disposal site for waste already on the property, contaminated soil in the surrounding ditches and the waste from HISS. The City of St. Louis refuses to transfer the property to the Department of Energy.

1985Ìý— Custody of the Weldon Spring Site is transferred to the Department of Energy in order to clean up contamination left from the site’s prior activities. The cleanup effort is designated the . Surface remediation concludes with completion of a 41-acre, onsite disposal cell in 2001. The cell provides long-term isolation for 1.48 million cubic yards of low-level radioactive waste and chemical waste.

1986 — The Department of Energy works with municipal governments of Berkeley and Hazelwood to remove 4,600 cubic yards of contaminated waste during road and drainage improvement projects and takes it to Latty Avenue.

1989 — Congress places the airport site and the Latty Avenue sites on a priority list for environmental cleanup. In Madison, a survey of the Dow Chemical Co. buildings indicates low-level radioactive contamination is present in dust located on overhead surfaces in Building 6. About 2 cubic yards of contaminated uranium/thorium dust from Manhattan Project/Atomic Energy Commission operations is identified on roof beams at the facility. The Post-Dispatch publishes a special six-part series, “Legacy of the Bomb,â€� that explains the role St. Louis played in development of the atomic bomb and the contamination left behind.Ìý

1990 — West Lake Landfill is designated a Superfund site by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. The EPA and the Department of Energy reach an agreement on assigning responsibilities for cleanup of St. Louis sites.

1995 — The Department of Energy begins shipping radioactive wastes to a disposal facility in Utah that is run by Envirocare. First to go is 9,500 cubic yards of waste removed from the Mallinckrodt site north of downtown.

1996 — The Department of Energy agrees to remove wastes from the airport and related sites instead of building a storage bunker onsite.

1997 — The Department of Energy digs up 7,000 cubic yards of waste on the west end of the airport site and ships it to Utah. Congress transfers cleanup duties to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

1998 — The Corps moves 24,000 cubic yards of waste from airport, downtown and Latty Avenue sites to Utah.

1999 — The Corps moves 50,000 cubic yards of waste from the sites to Utah.

2000 — The Corps continues cleanup work. Workers begin to scrape dirt from the radium pits at the airport site to ship to Utah.

2005 — FUSRAP issues its on the cleanup of north St. Louis County sites.

2008 — The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, , proposes to place a multilayered rock, clay and soil cap over the West Lake Landfill and install monitoring wells. Environmental activists, who want the radioactive waste removed, condemn the recommendation. Waste giant Republic Services buys Allied Waste, entering the St. Louis market and taking ownership of both the Bridgeton and West Lake landfills.Ìý 

2010 — Republic Services reports underground smoldering at the Bridgeton landfill.

2011 —  by several residents of north St. Louis County concerned about what appear to be high death and disease rates among former classmates, family and friends who may have been exposed to radiation.Ìý

2012 — Current and former north St. Louis County residents sue Mallinckrodt and other companies, claiming reckless and negligent handling of radioactive waste caused their cancers and other illnesses. Eventually hundreds of plaintiffs file suit. Some cases are settled; others remain active. A Bridgeton resident starts  to share concerns about the landfills; that effort leads to the launch of Just Moms STL, an activist group, in 2014.

2013 — The Missouri Department of Natural Resources (DNR) declares odors generated by the smoldering waste at Bridgeton Landfill a nuisance and orders Republic Services to pay for air sampling. Missouri Attorney General Chris Koster sues Republic, accusing the company of violating state environmental laws. An agreement, reached in May, outlines a plan of action that includes capping the landfill by early September. Republic Services agrees to build a fire break between the Bridgeton and West Lake landfills to alleviate concern that the reaction will spread to radioactive contamination in West Lake.

2014 — Republic Services is nearly finished with a wastewater plant. A leachate collection system, a gas extraction system and a cap and flare system to reduce odors and gases are in place.  (63031, 63033, 63034, 63042, 63043, 63055, 63134 and 63138) in the Coldwater Creek watershed and finds elevated levels of certain cancers. A DNR consultant warns that fire is approaching the northern area of Bridgeton Landfill, which is adjacent to West Lake, and is not under control, refuting Republic Services’ assurances. Republic Services launches a lobbying group, the Coalition to Keep Us Safe, to support the EPA’s 2008 decision to place a rock, clay and soil cap over the West Lake Landfill.

2015 — Another DNR consultant warns of air intrusion and the possibility of a subsurface fire, or the precursor to one, in “close proximity� to the radioactive waste in the West Lake Landfill. The EPA begins testing for radioactive waste it now believes may be in the northern edge of the Bridgeton Landfill, outside of the restricted West Lake area. DNR asks for more measures to control the landfill fire and keep it from reaching the northern portion of the landfill. Koster releases expert reports indicating that the fire is moving closer to the radioactive waste and that radiological contamination was found in some off-site vegetation. St. Louis County releases an emergency plan and school districts send letters home, prompting widespread concern. Construction on the barrier from West Lake, awaiting approval from the EPA, still has not started. The Corps says its testing finds “low-level� radioactive contamination from thorium 230 of residential properties along Coldwater Creek. It’s the first time the government has confirmed radioactive contamination of residential properties caused by Mallinckrodt-produced waste.

2015-2017 — Radioactive waste is the subject of a series of documentaries, including locally produced “� (2015) and “� (2015) and HBO’s “� (2017).

2016 — Regional EPA officials say they hope to identify a proposed remedy to the Bridgeton landfill fire by the end of the year. Despite public outcry after the 2008 decision, EPA officials say they haven’t abandoned the plan to cap the landfill. But recent EPA studies identify radioactive contamination beyond where it was originally mapped, some of it outside a protective fence surrounding the landfill. EPA officials later announce that the decision had been postponed. Meanwhile, activists push for the Corps to take over West Lake landfill.

2017 — Before a U.S. House Energy and Commerce subcommittee, new EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt said the agency would announce a cleanup proposal at West Lake in January. The following day, the site was named one of 21 Superfund sites in the country to be targeted for “immediate, intense action,â€� based on the recommendations of a Superfund Task Force. In an interview with conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt, Pruitt calls for a “back to basicsâ€� agenda for his agency, prioritizing cleanup of Superfund sites like West Lake. “It’s unacceptable for the West Lake facility … to languish on a national priority list for 20-plus years,â€� he says.ÌýEPA says its testing finds no radioactive contamination in Bridgeton homes near the landfill.Ìý

2018 — The EPA proposes partially excavating the West Lake Landfill’s “radiologically impacted material� to a depth of 16 feet. The approach would be paired with installation of a cap designed to meet certain standards for containing uranium radiation. Missouri Attorney General Josh Hawley reaches a $16 million settlement with landfill operators, ending the 2013 lawsuit brought by his predecessor, Chris Koster. The settlement reimburses state regulators and sets aside $12.5 million for community projects and grants in a fund administered by the St. Louis Community Foundation. The settlement also provides for monitoring requirements and pollution limits for the landfill operators.

2019 — . It has four key findings. It finds that radiological contamination in and around Coldwater Creek, prior to remediation activities, could have increased the risk of some types of cancer in people who played or lived there. But the agency notes that “other exposure pathways of concern� could have contributed to risk, but is unable to quantify that risk. The agency does not recommend additional general disease screening for past or present residents around Coldwater Creek, but supports ongoing efforts to identify and properly remediate radiological waste around the creek.

2021 — Despite the Corps’ ramped up efforts to remediate the Coldwater Creek watershed, the work is not expected to be completed until 2038 — nearly a century after uranium ore first arrived at the Mallinckrodt plant, the Post-Dispatch reports.Ìý

2022 — The Hazelwood School District votes to close Jana Elementary in Florissant in response to a report commissioned by lawyers in an ongoing lawsuit. The report claims radioactive waste was found at the school up to 22 times the expected level. The Corps disputes the findings, and its subsequent tests and those by another consulting firm hired by the district say the school and the school grounds are safe.

2023 — , and The Associated Press review “â€� in what’s billed as “a historical re-investigationâ€� of St. Louis’ atomic legacy.ÌýU.S. Sen. Josh Hawley, the former Missouri attorney general, and U.S. Rep. Cori Bush, D-St. Louis, announce plans to introduce legislation to create a fund to pay for the medical care of the victims of radioactive contamination in the St. Louis metro region.