Fateful Harvest: The True Story of a Small Town, a Global Industry, and a Toxic Secret

by Duff Wilson

A riveting exposé, Fateful Harvest tells the story of Patty Martin -- the mayor of a small Washington town called Quincy -- who discovers American industries are dumping toxic waste into farmers' fields and home gardens by labeling it "fertilizer." She becomes outraged at the failed crops, sick horses, and rare diseases in her town, as well as the threats to her children's health. Yet, when she blows the whistle on a nationwide problem, Patty Martin is nearly run out of town. Duff Wilson, whose Seattle Times series on this story was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, provides the definitive account of a new and alarming environmental scandal. Fateful Harvest is a gripping study of corruption and courage, of recklessness and reckoning. It is a story that speaks to the greatest fears -- and ultimate hope -- in us all.

Genres: Nonfiction, Health, Food, Science, Environment, Politics, Crime

336 pages, Paperback

First published September 4, 2001

Reviews

[Natalie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Everyone who eats food or has kids should read this book. Does that cover you?

Recommended this book again today(5/6/11), for the umpteenth time. Why?

This story and the way it is told and the way the story continues after the book is done should make it compelling reading for any environmental or community activist -indeed maybe should be required reading for anyone seeking justice, writing about those seeking it, or exploring the rights of the invididual vs the rights of coporations in today's economic and political landscape in North America.

It's easy to think of political or environmental progress in terms of a +positive+ journalistic arc of Injustice or Curiosity->Investigation->Discovery->Coming to Justice.

Great journalism and community driven change are often built out of such investigation and reporting. Somtimes justice prevails and journalistic awards are given out. Sometimes the good guys and their supporters drink champagne.

Then, the lights dim, and the readers are left with the warm glow of a happy ending while the protagonists (now off-stage) get cold shouldered in small towns, win office only to get voted out the next term, lose their jobs, their savings, their farms, die of cancer, etc., etc., etc. . . .

Cruel Surprise: nonfiction doesn't always have a happy ending (See, Seized! A Sea Captain's Adventures Battling Pirates and Recovering Stolen Ships in the World's Most Troubled Waters if you need another example.

[Tara · Rating 5 out of 5]

In a small town in the southwest corner of Washington lies the toxic legacy of the fertilizer industry.

Quincy is a small farming town whose people become divided between farming and public safety when they are made aware of Cenex's selling of toxic waste as fertilizer containing cadmium, arsenic, lead and dioxins. Patty Martin is a true hero who runs for mayor to clean up her town but is eventually voted out of office after farmers (80 percent of the town's economy is based in potato farming) don't want to start a nation-wide scare that would damage their livelihood.

After traveling the nation to concerned farmers and sympathetic scientists, Martin learns there are no federal or state laws prohibiting such "dumping". In fact, she learns, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency considers it a preferable method of disposal. And there are no regulations requiring fertlizing manufacturers to list their ingredients. Even in "organic" fertilizers. Even today.

This gripping tale is based on series of entirely true stories published in The Seattle Times by investigative journalist Duff Wilson. Wilson, now a reporter for The New York Times.

This was one of my favorite books.

[Liz Allen · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was published when I was a high school senior, I knew nothing of it then, but in the last few years I've done more and more work focused on ag. in the Northwest. Many of the places and some of the names in the book are familiar to me, but I never knew the story of hazardous waste "recycling" as fertilizer from this angle. The story sheds a light on how and why a lot of state and federal environmental regulation works and does't work... spurred me to want to learn a lot more about soil health, toxicology and the farmer-fertilizer rep. relationship. This was great investigative reporting with compelling descriptions of the individuals involved.

[Kharismatic]

She began to suspect the chemicals in the fertilizer, and she observed the local company that sold fertilizers to the farmers. They got the chemicals from industries that needed to dispose of their toxic waste and saved a lot of money--enormous sums--by selling it to fertilizer companies. It was very expensive to put the wastes in disposal sites. Because of EPA regulatory loopholes, fertilizer companies could process it into granular form, blend it with dirt and sell it to unsuspecting farmers. And it was perfectly legal!

Review by Jane Greenleaf

[Daneen · Rating 5 out of 5]

I did not enjoy this book, but it is a MUST read for everyone who thinks the food you eat has been grown safely. The only way for change to occur is for everyone to understand what is happening! This story broke open in Quincy, WA--my backyard; however, this is where the story starts with a very strong woman!! Although it starts in this small farming community in Central Washington, the story is for everyone.

A MUST READ -- it is disturbing to learn what is allowed all in the name of obtaining the almighty dollar.

[Nick Havens · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have hesitated to review this book for more than a month now because my feelings were so strong and the story seemed so crazy that it couldn't be true.
This book documents a small town mayor discovering and trying her darnedest to expose toxic wastes being diluted and repackaged as product. The companies responsible went through a lot of trouble trying to keep her quiet... you know how you have that nightmare about how politics works and it's a lot like 'house of cards'? This book shows you some of the human cost.

[Dennis Littrell · Rating 5 out of 5]

How hazardous waste is turned into fertilizer

Duff Wilson is an investigative reporter for the Seattle Times who got a call one day from Patty Martin, mayor of Quincy, Washington, who told him an almost unbelievable tale of toxic waste being sold as fertilizer. The zinger was, as Wilson discovered, it was entirely legal!

Imagine this: big industrial companies, growing increasingly displeased with having to pay for the cost of disposing of their hazardous waste materials, typically with unsafe amounts of heavy metals, find through a loophole in the law that they can declare the waste a "product" and sell it as fertilizer! Instead of paying perhaps a hundred dollars a barrel to get rid of the stuff, they can sell it to firms that add a little lime or some other soil conditioner and abracadabra! peddle it as fertilizer. Sound like a Greenpeace scare story? A nightmare dreamed up by disgruntled employees? "Bad" farmers looking to blame somebody for their failed Frankenfeed crops? The fertilizer industry would like us to think so, but this story about Patty Martin and her brave and lonely crusade against the dumping of hazard waste on farmlands tells us otherwise.

The terrible thing is that, although Wilson's original story, "Fear in the Fields--How Hazardous Wastes Become Fertilizer," first appeared in July of 1997, as the book closes in 2001, the loophole in the law has not been plugged, congress has not acted, and the polluters are still turning hazardous waste infused with cadmium, lead, arsenic, etc., into stuff smeared on farmlands. It gets into the crops farmers grow and ends up in the food on our dining room tables. It blows off the fields when it's dry and into the lungs of people. The workers in these fertilizer plants have elevated levels of cancer and lung scaring disease, and the sad thing is some of them are so wedded to the company that they are blind to what is destroying their bodies.

Wilson names names and gives examples. He cites the chemical analyses and he quotes the industry apologists and the look-the-other-way bureaucrats in the oversight agencies. But clearly the real culprits are those people at the top of our state and federal governments who are doing nothing stop this dangerous pollution.

This is the kind of story that'll make you hopping mad and wonder about the morality (and sanity) of people who would, to save a few bucks on the bottom line, poison us, themselves and our children.

--Dennis Littrell, author of “The World Is Not as We Think It Is”

[Serge Pierro · Rating 5 out of 5]

“Fateful Harvest” proved to be both interesting and disturbing. Author Duff Wilson’s nomination for a Pulitzer Prize for the original “Seattle Times” series is well earned, as he provides an engaging look into the lives of farmers, small town life and the unscrupulous businessmen within the fertilizer/toxic waste industries.

It is hard to believe the ordeal that small town mayor, Patty Martin, was put through in her pursuit of exposing the fertilizer industry’s use of heavy metal waste products as ingredients in fertilizer, and it was heartbreaking to see longtime farmers lose their land as the toxic fertilizers wreaked havoc on their crops and soil.

While the level of corruption is not unexpected when dealing with the lowlifes in politics, it was still hard to read about close friends turning on Patty Martin and her family as she pursued her goals. However, that is one of the high points of the book, as Duff Wilson portrays the personalities within the story as real-life human beings with careers, dreams and goals. And while the story is about the use of waste products in fertilizers, you will find yourself captivated by many of the personalities contained within the story.

It’s hard to believe that this is/was a common practice within the industry, and you can’t help but wonder how much of this toxic material you have in your body due to eating food that was grown utilizing these products. The book is certainly an eyeopening experience and an interesting insight into the lives of the people involved.

[Dylan · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a book that my dad had found when i was in high school and he told me of the possibilities of lead in our french fries among other horrible things that really are difficult to see for their full implications.
However now older and ready for the horrible news that this book exposes i tore threw this book in three days grimly fascinated with the truth uncovered from this little town in Quincy, WA.
Heavy metals are getting into synthetic fertilizers and now legally. Gary Locke and his task force which included the strong willed mayor of Quincy but also big industrialists who were a large cause of the dumping of hazardous wastes into fertilizer so they can sell it as a product and thus avoid the costs of shipping it to toxic waste dumps.
You can go to Washington State Department of Agriculture to see the tests they used with the nine heavy metals: arsenic, lead, cadmium, cobalt, mercury, molybdenum, nickel, selenium, and zinc that were approved to be tested in all commercial fertilizers sold in Washington.
Here is the link: http://agr.wa.gov/pestfert/fertilizer...

This testing of these 9 is some good in picking fertilizers that may meet the 'cleaner than dirt' standards the author put forth in guidelines for safe fertilizer. However those 9 heavy metals doesn't include the beryllium, and possible uranium they found in certain fertilizer and that MOST FERTILIZERS IN THE UNITED STATES HAVE HIGH AMOUNTS OF HEAVY METALS NOW MADE LEGAL to use in conventional food productions.

The biggest study that needs to be done is: How much are our foods taking up from these heavy metals? How can we start a lawsuit with this? How can we prove for legal certainty that these fertilizers dumped with heavy metals and industrial wastes cause cancers and other diseases and extremely unhealthy for us and the environment.

I know in the book it is mentioned that "organic" fertilizers contained heavy metals as well. To make a clarification on whether this means organic food is contaminated or not, in the production of certified usda organic food there is to be no use of commercial synthetic fertilizers. Only manure from organic fed cattle, horses, etc. or other forms of humus etc. must be used. There may be some small loopholes in a contaminated fertilizer getting in, but on the whole organic grown food on an industrial distribution route or local and/or sustainable farms do not use commercial fertilizers operating in this dump heavy metals into realm.
Or at least as far as i can tell. One thing that is disturbing though is that heavy metals used in soil do not all run off from the soil immediately. The standards for a produce item to be cert. organic is that the land cannot have been using conventional methods for three years. THAT IS NOT enough time to wash out the heavy metals that have been accumulated in the soil due to tainted fertilizers. Buying from a local non fertilizer sustainable farm is your best bet for healthy food because you can go to the farm and ask the farmer about the history of the farm and whether or not they know about this important work of journalism. Inform farmers! I know i will the best i can here in washington, the state of this uncovered information.
One last thing to emphasize. If people think this fertilizer is isolated to washington state or california, it's the entire united states, and not only that, Canada (who has just a little better regulations than Washington state got on dumping wastes in fertilizers), and the entire world at large. You can bet poor third world countries are getting this industrially dumped fertilizers as well, probably in more quantities, and even 1st world countries in Europe don't have exacting laws against this.
It's a f**cking travesty and we need to be aware and tell as many people as we can. As you can tell its an issue that i feel at a gut level is something beyond politics, its harmful. we need people to be aware, perhaps the most important power we have as consumers is choosing different products, and its a power that hasn't been fully used yet in america where we are constantly lied to about the safety of our food. Let's see if we can f**k with their well being as well, and their well being is profit, profit, profit...like it matters if it gives people cancer and kills them slow and insidiously.

[Meghan · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is a must read for anyone who farms, keeps livestock, or grocery shops. Really, this is a must read for anyone who eats. The premise: toxic waste full of heavy metals is being recycled into fertilizer. It is killing fields, killing stock, and killing people. The book follows the story of Patty and a few others in a small town as they fight against what they initially think is a local corrupt company. It turns out to be a country-wide problem, complete with coverups and purposely poor regulation.

So why only three stars?

The writing is, imho, terrible. It is a book about chemicals, the author needed to write in a somewhat academic style for credibility reasons. He does not (and at one point uses an expression like "hound dog in a skunk convention"). His afterword is written in a much more knowledgeable manner and I conclude, for the rest of the book, he was trying to make this subject matter more accessible. Sadly, it sounds like he thinks we are all complete idiots, and that we are incapable of understanding basic good writing. Some of it could have been forgiven if the author himself was a farmer (for instance from chapter 5: "They had thirty-four heifers kicking the hell out of the milking parlor."). However, he is a journalist, from a line of journalists. It honestly made me question the validity of the claims and the integrity of the writer. Again, it wouldn't have mattered in a different book. But a book that accuses large name companies and government bureaus of wrongdoing needed to be factual and clear-cut, not full of cliches and silly phrases. He also tells us a bit too much of his own journey and involvement, and that was completely unnecessary here.

So in sum: a valuable book for subject matter, and important information to know, but suffered terribly in delivery.

[Elaine Duff]

I chose to read this book for my AP class because it hit close to home. well maybe a little too close. my family has never used fertilizer and doesn't believe in it. we have always had our own garden and bought from the local farmer's market. living on your own farm and raising your own meat has its perks. I've learned that organic in the store is not always organic. I will look into this more thanks to this book. I've also learned to take action and to never stay silent when you can make a difference, even a tiny scratch, in the world and for those you love. Patty is my new inspiration.

[Meghan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ok, this book isn't written in a very scholarly way, but it's a quick, easy, page-turning read about an important topic - the fact that manufactures across the US are disposing of toxic and hazardous waste by adding it to fertilizer, even supposedly "organic" products. It's written by the Seattle Times reporter who broke the story in 2000 and focuses on several towns in WA where farmers and townspeople are getting sick and dying.

[Pat Mckay · Rating 5 out of 5]

Once again ordinary people the world over are being shafted by corporations, their highly-paid lobbyists, and all the government they can buy, all in the name of making a buck. It's incredible to read how hazardous waste can magically -- and legally -- be "transformed" into fertilizer. It wouldn't happen if the decision-makers had to live where they spread this stuff, where it could poison their own families. A well-researched and documented book from a Seattle Times reporter.

[Pamela Snyder · Rating 5 out of 5]

A documentary/expose on toxic waste being 'incorporated' into fertilizers...our food supply, our land. A story of one woman's fight to expose the big fertilizer companies only to find out the government doesn't care or regulate it. If we get cancer, or our land is ruined...its a cost the government is willing FOR US to pay. This made me very mad, and want to move to a different place w/o any industry. Who can you trust?

[stagger lee · Rating 5 out of 5]

unless you are excited about eating toxic waste in your food, this frightening true story of a strong-ass women uncovering the truth about modern fertilizer is a must read! while folks are still working on this topic, little has been done. in the meantime, we are slowing poisoning ourselves and our environment.

[Carolina · Rating 5 out of 5]

Everyone should read this book and be outraged to action. It should be in every library. It tells the important and horrifying story of how corporations recycle toxic waste into consumer products (fertilizer, which is spread on our farmlands) to avoid paying superfund site fees.

[Tamar · Rating 5 out of 5]

I spent my younger years growing up in Quincy, Washington. I know the people and places in this book and I find it's message deeply disturbing. How many small, rural towns of Eastern Washington suffer from the same pollutants, and why doesn't the public ever inquire into these issues?

[Erin Oliver · Rating 4 out of 5]

Overall very interesting scientific non-fiction. While many books of this genre get too complicated for people outside the realm of specific scientific knowledge, this book was written like a story and likely very easy for anyone middle school aged and up to understand.

[Liberty · Rating 5 out of 5]

hmmm....."conventional produce" sure sounds.....scary. Thanks, Land-O-Lakes! I appreciate your contamination.

[Rachael · Rating 4 out of 5]

Scary stuff! Raises interesting questions about the contents of commercial fertilizers and the issue of "recycling" industrial wastes.

[Jared · Rating 4 out of 5]

Well written book. Disturbing information on the fertilizer industry...

[Crystal · Rating 5 out of 5]

Eye opening to what is and can happen.

[Larry · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great book by an Omak High School graduate no less. Duff Wilson brought to light toxic secrets in the fertilizer industry that was taking place right in my own piece of Eastern Washington.....

[Sidney Rodriguez]

This really raised my awareness of food security and our legal system in regards to it. Much of what I learned raised my eyebrows. Definitely worth the time to read.

[Starr · Rating 4 out of 5]

Frightening true story of a few farmers and a tireless woman who try to expose the use of hazardous waste as "fertilizers". I'd like to do some followup to see if this is still a legal practice.

[Andrew Smith · Rating 5 out of 5]

After you read this book you will only eat organic vegetables! Wilson's truth about how they use toxic chemicals in farming, even in small communities like Quincy Washington, is an eye opener. You are better off growing your own vegetables!