Word: kerr
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...young man in tight blue jeans and tooled leather boots approaches not to buy but to gab. "Say, Jim. You want a full military funeral when Kerr-McGee gets done with you? We'll have to find you a lead coffin so you don't contaminate the cemetery. How many pall bearers you figure it takes to haul a lead coffin...
That bit of morbid humor refers to possible resentment by the Kerr-McGee Corp., a major energy conglomerate, over testimony Smith has given in a bitter trial. It is the celebrated $11.5 million negligence suit brought by the heirs of Karen Silkwood, a former employee at a Kerr-McGee plutonium-processing facility in nearby Crescent (pop. 1,568). She accused the company of being cavalier about worker safety, and then died at 28 in a still mysterious car accident in 1974. The trial, however, focuses on charges that Kerr-McGee was negligent in a series of plutonium contaminations that took...
Because Smith served for almost six years as a plant supervisor with Kerr-McGee, he was briefly last month the main event in Oklahoma City's federal courthouse. Neither accused nor accuser, he was required to tell the truth about subjects he would rather not have discussed. Now the witness is finding that day in court still intrudes on his life, even at the Old Paris Flea Market...
When Smith left Rocky Flats for Oklahoma in 1969, he commanded several dozen men and made $12,000 a year. He had similar responsibilities with Kerr-McGee, where his crews produced fuel pellets for experimental reactors. When the plant closed in 1975, Smith was furloughed. His wife Phyllis, 43, a tall brunette with fashionably frizzed hair, carried the family finances with her job as a district manager for Avon. Smith began doing the family cooking. He also kept busy taking his motor home to auctions, picking up stuff for the flea market. He and Phyllis spent a lot of time...
...market indicated the public's response. Shares of Columbia Pictures, which gained a publicity bonanza for its movie, soared by $2.74 in two days, to $24.75. Stocks of nuclear power companies declined sharply. General Public Utilities, which owns the damaged plant, dropped 50¢ a share, while the stock of Kerr-McGee plunged...