Peter Goin is the author of Tracing the Line: A Photographic Survey of the Mexican-American Border (limited edition artist book, 1987), Nuclear Landscapes (The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1991), Stopping Time: A Rephotographic Survey of Lake Tahoe with essays by C. Elizabeth Raymond and Robert E. Blesse (University of New Mexico Press, 1992), and Humanature (University of Texas Press, 1996). He served as editor of a fifth book, Arid Waters: Photographs from the Water in the West Project (University of Nevada Press, 1992). Peter is also co-author of numerous books, including the Atlas of the New West, a collaborative effort with members of the Center of the American West at the University of Colorado at Boulder; A Doubtful River (University of Nevada Press, 2000) a project that examines the complex watershed of the first federal irrigation dam, the Newlands Project; and, Changing Mines in America (Center for American Places distributed by the University of Chicago Press, 2004) reinterpreting the legacy and importance of mining landscapes throughout the United States. In 2005, Peter and Paul F. Starrs served as co-authors of the seminal BLACK ROCK (University of Nevada Press), a dedicated investigation of a phenomenal desert region in northern Nevada. Peter’s photographs have been exhibited in more than fifty museums nationally and internationally, and he is the recipient of two National Endowment for the Arts Fellowships. Peter’s video work has earned him an EMMY nomination as well as the Best Experimental Video Award at the 2001 New York International Film & Video Festival. At the turn of the new century, Peter was awarded the Governor’s Millennium Award for Excellence in the Arts.
In fall of 2009, the Black Rock Institute Press published the Fine Art limited edition, slip-cased book titled Nevada Rock Art, Peter’s focused study on Nevada’s petroglyphs and pictographs. Reflecting his long-standing work studying Lake Tahoe, Peter was the author of South Lake Tahoe: Then & Now and co-author with Paul F. Starrs of A Field Guide to California Agriculture that won the J. B. Jackson Prize for publishing excellence.
Information about books is available @ (775) 322-3541 or by fax @ (775) 784-6655. Peter’s web address is petergoin.com. Email is pgoin@unr.edu.
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- This view of Jackass Flats, bordered by Skull (center) and Little Skull (far right) mountains was taken from the top of Yucca Mountain. Yucca Mountain is a proposed disposal site for high-level nuclear wastes from across the country.
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- This surviving trial railroad trestle stands in Frenchman’s Lake, Yucca Flat. This bridge, the only remaining section of an elevated railroad, was located 1,800 feet from ground zero and received overpressures exceeding 450 pounds per square inch. The blast blew sections of the structure off the foundation and bent large I-beam girders. This detonation, code named “Pricilla,” had 37 kilotons of force. By comparison, the blast at Hiroshima measured 13 kilotons.
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- This view at the west end of Yucca Flat shows the shadow of the Eleana Mountain Range along its alluvial plane. Numerous above-ground tests were conducted in this area.
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- This crater remains from the Plowshares program, the purpose of which was to test the peaceful use of nuclear explosions. The operating hypothesis was that a nuclear explosion could easily excavate a large area, facilitating the building of canals and roads, improving mining techniques, or simply moving a large amount of rock and soil. The intensity and distribution of radiation proved too great, and the program was abandoned. The “Sedan” device was thermonuclear—70 percent fusion, 30 percent fission—with a yield of 100 kilotons. The crater is an impressive 635 feet deep and 1,280 feet wide. The weight of the material lifted was 12 million tons.
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- This trench is located in the geographic center of the Hanford Nuclear Reservation and is called the Burial Gardens. Contaminated materials are loaded into a variety of containers—barrels, crates, sheds—and stored in open trenches. When a trench is full it is backfilled and marked with yellow posts identifying the presence of radioactivity. The buildings in the background (left and right) are plutonium metallurgical laboratories and incinerators.
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- These abandoned and overgrown railroad tracks served a nuclear reactor located along the Columbia River near the old White Bluffs townsite.
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- This drain housing on the Columbia River was surrounded and covered with fencing, to keep out all wildlife, including birds. The reactor drain is no longer in use, but the structure remains severely contaminated.
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- These reactors are now decommissioned. D Reactor was one of the three original reactors built between 1943 and 1945. The R in DR stands for “replacement.” The yellow posts identify buried radioactive waste and potential surface contamination.
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- This is the site of the world’s first nuclear explosion on 16 July 1945 at 5:29:45 A.M. Mountain War Time near White Sands, New Mexico on the Alamorgordo Bombing Range in the Jornada del Muerto desert, where the dawn of the nuclear age began.
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- This abandoned platform on Kidrenen Island, Enewetak Atoll, continues to rust away.
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- This was Station 77. The left door was the entrance to the timing and firing distribution station; the right door led to the telephone switchboard; and the structure on the roof (Station 1511) housed camera mounts. These were constructed for Operation Redwing (1956) on Runit Island, Enewetak Atoll. Shifting sands have caused this bunker to lean toward the water.
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- As part of the entertainment facilities for test site personnel, a Greek theater was constructed on Enewetak Island.
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- This bunker complex was a photographic station and optical station used during Operation Redwing (1956) and subsequent operations on Aomen Island, Bikini Atoll. Several lead bricks can be seen in center foreground at the water’s edge. These were used in constructing radiation barriers.
