Three days before Christmas 1976, Edward Nevin III was standing on a BART platform, newspaper in hand, waiting for his train into the city. Amid front page stories detailing a hijacking attempt at SFO and the “computer threat” to the Postal Service, Nevin’s eye was caught by another headline: “Army Tested Biological War in S.F.”
The story spoke of simulated biological attacks on San Francisco that took place over a few days in 1950. No one in the city knew the test was happening, and at least one civilian, a 75-year-old man, died after being exposed to the bacteria. The man’s name was Edward Nevin.
That article was how the Nevin family, scattered across the Bay Area, learned about what actually killed their beloved patriarch decades earlier. And although largely forgotten today, the story set off a firestorm of anger and fear about the U.S. government treating its citizens like a laboratory full of guinea pigs…