Speaker 1: This is Lee Habib and this is Our American Stories,
Speaker 1: the show where America is the star and the American people.
Speaker 1: And to search for the Our American Stories podcast, go
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Speaker 1: From nineteen forty five to nineteen ninety two, the United
Speaker 1: States conducted one thy fifty four nuclear tests as a
Speaker 1: part of the nuclear arms race with Soviet Russia. Many
Speaker 1: of these tests were conducted in Nevada, where soldiers were
Speaker 1: sent to be tested on by military scientists and upper
Speaker 1: brass trying to figure out the psychological and health effects
Speaker 1: brought on by the use of nuclear weapons. One of
Speaker 1: those soldiers was Tobi Madrid. Here's listener Richard Munez, who
Speaker 1: worked with Toby with the story of this atomic Marine.
Speaker 2: The only two people I know I know I ever
Speaker 2: heard this story is myself and his son Jr. As
Speaker 2: far as Jr knows, he never told his story to
Speaker 2: anyone else. Toby was in the Marines and in nineteen
Speaker 2: fifty one to nineteen fifty seven out in Nevada proving grounds.
Speaker 2: It a small camp, It's called Camp Desert Rock, and
Speaker 2: it was barricks and mess halls and things like that.
Speaker 2: But it had one mission, one purpose. It was to
Speaker 2: support military personnel while tests involving the atomic bomber conducted.
Speaker 2: Remember Sheriff Toby to Madrid. We were in his office
Speaker 2: if you can call a broom closet with a light
Speaker 2: and a desk and an office. He had a cup
Speaker 2: of coffee in his hands, and he has feet up
Speaker 2: on the desk. I mean, it was totally laid back attitude,
Speaker 2: but I could see the tension in his The funny
Speaker 2: part about it was he wasn't looking at me, and
Speaker 2: he wasn't looking at JR. He was looking at the wall.
Speaker 2: I had this distinct impression that if he bothered to
Speaker 2: look at either one of us, we'd never hear the story.
Speaker 2: He said, they stuck us out in the middle of nowhere,
Speaker 2: And if you've ever been out that section of Nevada,
Speaker 2: it's pretty much the middle of nowhere. And he went
Speaker 2: on to say that they told us we're part of
Speaker 2: an atomic bomb test. Now, the name of these tests
Speaker 2: that I looked up later on was called the Desert
Speaker 2: Rock Exercises, and this is what we call Desert Rock
Speaker 2: for Operation tumblr Snapper. Well, he said they took him
Speaker 2: out there and they were there for several different several
Speaker 2: days beforehand, the sheriff said, they took him out there,
Speaker 2: had the trenches, they built, the defensive fortified positions, all
Speaker 2: that stuff. Now, the idea was they were to be
Speaker 2: able to stand in these or squat at them some cover.
Speaker 2: And then he said, I remembered as we were digging,
Speaker 2: there were trucks carrying tanks and jeeps and things like that.
Speaker 2: Some of the vehicles were towing artillery pieces out there,
Speaker 2: and some of the marines he was with went out
Speaker 2: with them, and they came back to saying how they'd
Speaker 2: set up dummies that were in uniform and some of
Speaker 2: them were standing up, some were lying down. That kind
Speaker 2: of stuff. Now I went on to research a little
Speaker 2: bit more, and this seems to be that he was
Speaker 2: out there for what they called the Shot Dog nuclear test.
Speaker 2: And this happened on May one, nineteen fifty two, and
Speaker 2: involved the dropping of what we call a Mark seven bomb. Now,
Speaker 2: the Air Force was doing the drops and they were
Speaker 2: using either B fifties or B forty five to do these.
Speaker 2: So he said the day of the test, they got
Speaker 2: them up, they had breakfast, and they took them out
Speaker 2: there to the site, and they got in their trenches
Speaker 2: and what they were told to do. They were told
Speaker 2: to crouchs below the rim of the trench, have their
Speaker 2: faces down, their eyes closed when the blast happened. Now,
Speaker 2: they would get plenty of warning beforehand that this was
Speaker 2: going to happen, you know, give him a warning. The
Speaker 2: bomber was to hear the bombers coming in, stuff like that,
Speaker 2: and they needed to be doing this. She said. Along
Speaker 2: around eight thirty or so, they heard the aircraft coming in,
Speaker 2: and that's when the warning happened. So they climbed to
Speaker 2: the trenches and they got the position they were told
Speaker 2: to get into. He said he was pouched down, he
Speaker 2: had his head down, his eyes closed, and even with this,
Speaker 2: all of a sudden, he said, there was light. He
Speaker 2: seriously felt that he had actually seen the blast of
Speaker 2: the bomb. Now what he had witnessed here was the
Speaker 2: debtonishing of a nineteen kiloton bomb, and it exploded about
Speaker 2: a thousand meters above the ground. And then he went
Speaker 2: on to say that the light faded, but as it faded,
Speaker 2: there was thunder like they'd never heard before. And then
Speaker 2: there was wind. I mean, the wind just came up
Speaker 2: and it was so intense that it rocked him back
Speaker 2: against the back of his U wrench, and then the
Speaker 2: wind reverse directions came back and pushed him face forward
Speaker 2: into into uh the front of the trench. And so
Speaker 2: then the second few seconds later came to order to
Speaker 2: leave the trenches. So they climbed out, and as he
Speaker 2: put it, we've all seen movies of the mushroom cloud
Speaker 2: and atomic bomb generates, but he says, seeing that in
Speaker 2: real life, it was like it just wasn't real. You know,
Speaker 2: you can't you can't wrap your mind around something like this.
Speaker 2: And you sat there, I look at it and say, something
Speaker 2: humans built generated this. And he said it was already
Speaker 2: towering up into the sky, and he compared it to
Speaker 2: something that was like a cloud that was bowling up
Speaker 2: from Hell. And they told him to start walking forward,
Speaker 2: and they did. He went on to relate that as
Speaker 2: they moved along, he started seeing some of those things
Speaker 2: have been so a few days before, Like, for one location,
Speaker 2: remember seeing the Sherman tank and he said, look like
Speaker 2: the Shriman tanks had been swatted aside by some giant's hand.
Speaker 2: And then he started encountering some of these dummies had
Speaker 2: been set up some were almost burnt up entirely. Others
Speaker 2: were smoldering. So they kept walking. They got within about
Speaker 2: three quarters of a mile of where the bomb had exploded,
Speaker 2: and they stopped him. They turned him around and marched
Speaker 2: him back out of there. And he said, remember hearing
Speaker 2: somebody saying that it had gotten it was too hot
Speaker 2: to go much further, and well that basically mean was
Speaker 2: too radioactive. Then Marsha to a certain site. There they
Speaker 2: swept them off, hosed them off, and he says, actually
Speaker 2: surprised by how much dust came off of him and
Speaker 2: his up Latombe. And rather keep the uniform he had
Speaker 2: been wearing, he wadded it up and threw it away.
Speaker 2: Like I said, that's the only time that we know
Speaker 2: of as myself and Jr. That Toby actually ever talked
Speaker 2: about the day of the bomb. A lot of people
Speaker 2: wound up getting sick and dying because of exposure to fallout.
Speaker 2: The thing is, I don't think a lot of people
Speaker 2: knew what they were headed for. They had a pivotal
Speaker 2: moment of history and they didn't realize it. I know
Speaker 2: the chef didn't.
Speaker 1: And this is why we routinely celebrate our veterans on
Speaker 1: this show because our soldiers serve in so many distinct
Speaker 1: and dangerous ways, and you just heard about one, the
Speaker 1: story of Toby Madrid, the Atomic Marine. Here on our
Speaker 1: American Stories, Folks, if you love the stories we tell
Speaker 1: about this great country, and especially the stories of America's
Speaker 1: rich past, know that all of our stories about American history,
Speaker 1: from war to innovation, culture and faith, are brought to
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Speaker 1: where students study all the things that are beautiful in
Speaker 1: life and all the things that are good in life.
Speaker 1: And if you can't cut to Hillsdale, Hillsdale will come
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Speaker 1: to Hillsdale dot edu to learn more.