Center For Land Use Interpretation | Conqueror Film Location Site
“In 1954, a dust-filled movie called The Conqueror, starring John Wayne as Genghis Kahn, was shot in this valley, on ground that had been recently subjected to fallout from a series of nuclear tests at the nearby Nevada Test Site (especially dirty at this time was the 1953 above-ground test code-named “Harry”, which spread fallout over the down-wind portions of Utah).
…and around half (more than 90, at last count) of the cast and crew of 220 contracted cancer, many of whom died of their illness, including Susan Hayward, the director Dick Powell, Agnes Moorehead, and John Wayne himself. Statistically, this number should have been around 30.”
The world was a different place in 1954, in the infancy of the nuclear age…who knew?
I like to think the tragedy of the events stemming from this incident is due to ignorance and not evil intent; worst case negligence. Jump forward, we are over fifty years in the future. We, the public, know a lot more now about the effects of nuclear fallout and radioactive contamination. The obvious lesson to be learned is that location scouts and production alike would do well to keep their eyes and ears open and remain aware that we do in fact, live in a chemical/nuclear prevalent time and no location, regardless of aesthetic potential or potential financial saving to production is worth putting human life or well being at risk.
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