Fort Detrick (originally named Camp Detrick in 1943) was a plot of government-owned land used to establish the US Army Biological Warfare Laboratories (USBWL), where research and testing of extreme forms of biological and chemical warfare took place during and after World War II. Between 1943 and 1955, Camp Detrick expanded in size as the US government purchased larger quantities of the surrounding land to accommodate the growing use of chemical and weapons testing, which included Anthrax and missile technology. Area B was a 900-acre plot of land located west of the original Camp Detrick (Area A) and was used solely for testing and as a disposal site. Camp Detrick remained open for biological research during the Cold War period, and was renamed Fort Detrick in 1956. Both war and peacetime experiments performed at Fort Detrick, as well as the dumping of resulting chemicals, remained widely unknown to the public in the surrounding area. However, on 9 April 2009, the Environmental Protection Agency added “Fort Detrick Area B Ground Water” to the National Priorities List after high levels of Trichloroethylene (TCE) and Tetrachloroethylene (PCE), used as industrial degreasers, were found in groundwater throughout Frederick, Maryland.
Contributed by Colleen Alexander
Course: Global Environmental History
Instructor: Andrew Stuhl, Ph.D.
Bucknell University Lewisburg, US
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