Abstract
New York State needed a site for a nuclear waste dump. Commissioners chose locations near the author's home town in Allegany County, an undeveloped and sparsely populated area. Poet and Houghton College professor John Leax began to see the dump site as a moral issueCone that shows the nuclear industry's irresponsibility hiding behind the lie of cheap power. Leax joined a protest group, the Allegany County Non-Violent Action Group (ACNAG), and after small skirmishes, court injunctions, threats of $1000 fines and imprisonment, a showdown occurred. On April 5th, 1990, protestors blocked a bridge with chains, farm equipment, and about a hundred people. A phalanx of state troopers began to make arrests, eventually hitting people and even horses with their nightsticks. Midway to the site, the troopers retreated. That is the narrative of Leax's short journal.