Alice M. Stewart interviews

Collection

Identifier: 2003-002

Staff Only

Scope and Contents

The collection contains materials pertaining to the career of Dr. Alice Stewart and her research on the health consequences of exposure to radiation. In 1984, Dr. Stewart completed a sabbatical at Portland State University. The majority of materials in this collection are derived from that time. This collection includes audio cassettes and transcripts of speeches and interviews. The bulk of the materials are dated from 1984 to 1990. This collection may be of interest to individuals researching epidemiology, radiation exposure and illness, and the history of low-level radiation in medicine.

Dates

Creation: 1984-1990

Conditions Governing Access

There are no restrictions on access. This collection is open to the public.

Conditions Governing Use

OHSU Historical Collections & Archives (HC&A) is the owner of the original materials and digitized images in our collections, however, the collection may contain materials for which copyright is not held. Patrons are responsible for determining the appropriate use or reuse of materials. Consult with HC&A to determine if we can provide permission for use.

Biographical Note

Dr. Alice Stewart was born Alice Mary Naish in Sheffield, England on October 4, 1906. Receiving her medical degree from Cambridge in 1932, Dr. Stewart was the first to demonstrate the link between X-rays during pregnancy and childhood disease. Dr. Stewart found that children whose mothers had had an abdominal X-ray to determine the position of their baby were nearly twice as likely to have cancer as other children. Dr. Stewart warned that low-dose radiation posed more risk than physicians had previously recognized, and as a result, physicians no longer X-ray pregnant people. Her findings were initially met with outrage by doctors and the nuclear industry, but were later duplicated and the practice of X-rays during pregnancy was discontinued by the 1970s. In 1941, Dr. Stewart began research at Oxford on ammunition plant workers who filled shells with TNT. Her research concluded that increased exposure to TNT impaired the body’s ability to form blood. This discovery led Britain to revise their manufacturing processes.

Having authored more than 400 peer-reviewed papers, Dr. Stewart was a prolific scientist. She took courageous stands on controversial issues: for example, arguing that the data on Hiroshima survivors, which served as the main source for standards on safe levels of radiation exposure, were flawed and underestimated the harmful nature of radiation. Perhaps Dr. Stewart’s most famous investigation, pertaining to the health records of employees at the Hanford plutonium production plant in Washington state, came after her formal retirement. Dr. Stewart found a far higher occurrence of radiation-induced illness than was recorded in official studies. While Stewart herself acknowledged that the results of the study were outside of the range considered statistically significant, her research remains a significant response to the perceived bias in reports authored by the nuclear industry. Rudi Nussbaum, professor of physics at Portland State University (PSU), invited Dr. Stewart for a sabbatical at PSU in 1984. Dr. Alice Stewart died on June 3, 2002, aged 95, in Oxford, England.

Extent

1.3 Linear Feet

Language of Materials

English

Additional Description

Abstract

Dr. Alice Stewart (1906-2002) was a British radiologist recognized for her groundbreaking research on social medicine and the effects of radiation exposure on health. Dr. Stewart's notable research includes her studies of pediatric cancers related to X-rays, the health effects of working with TNT, and the investigation of health outcomes at the Hanford plutonium plant. This collection contains materials from 1984 to 1990 and contains audio cassettes and speech and interview transcripts. The majority of the content in this collection was created during Dr. Stewart’s sabbatical in Portland, Oregon in 1984.

Arrangement

This collection is organized into two series: “I. Interview Transcripts” and “II. Interview Audio.” The records of this series are filed in alphabetical order by the interviewer’s last name.