DATELINES

...Members have held more than eighty meetings in small towns across the state to educate voters and recruit volunteers to run local campaign efforts...

...It addresses in a generic way the production of nuclear waste— a problem inherent to the entire industry...

...But Lawrence County citizens, with help from the Citizens' Law Center in Rapid City, appealed to the state's Board of Minerals and Environment for a temporary hold on surface-mining permits and initiated the October vote on a moratorium...

...Both types remain dangerously radioactive for thousands of years, and no safe, long-term disposal method exists for either...

...he works for Homestake...

...Of course, the censorship process is the real test of the authorities' sincerity...

...We grind through miles of breathtakingly beautiful hills, now striped with raw bulldozed roads and perforated with hundreds of test holes...

...A Creative Approach to Learning BUFFALO, MINNESOTA John Ause's high-school history students can never be sure what to expect in his classroom...

...Ause turned eighteen at St...

...The first major battle of the campaign was over the wording on the ballot, which allows voters to vote "no" to nuclear waste rather than "yes" to shutting down Maine Yankee...

...Earlier measures, in 1980 and 1982, failed by wide margins...

...And Ause's teaching style has an impact, according to one former student...

...When I visited the classroom, there was a replication of a Vietnamese village and a small clay statue of a Buddhist monk sitting near a gasoline can...

...Olaf College, in Northfield, Minnesota...

...He is often a thorn in the side of school administrators and other teachers who believe that a school's survival depends more on efficiency than effectiveness...

...The Lays potato chip theory of nuclear power" is what Al Giordano calls it: "Bet you can't shut just one...

...When he noticed contradictions, he asked more questions...

...A sprinkler system sprays a cyanide solution over the heap, which percolates through the rock, dissolving minute particles of gold, to be collected in a catchment...

...Nuclear proponents have sought to shift the debate away from waste and onto Maine Yankee and the electricity it generates...

...At the bottom of the heap is an "impervious" liner designed to catch the liquid for recycling—an impervious liner that has been leaking six gallons of cyanide solution per day for a year...

...When the commission ignored their concerns, the two groups joined forces, circulating petitions to initiate a vote for a fourteen-month moratorium on surface-mining permits...

...DATELINES More Precious Than Gold DEADWOOD, SOUTH DAKOTA Under a big maple tree on the edge of town, Floyd talks about Homestake Mining Company's assault on the other side of the mountain that rises behind his house...

...The issue," says Giordano, "is who runs this country...

...That used to be Terraville," Floyd says...

...A few reviews submitted to the censors were not approved, however, and had to be eliminated...

...And so you make the next concession, and the next...

...DOE shifted the whole paradigm...

...Jane Dobija (Jane Dobija, a free-lance writer from Detroit, is currently living in Warsaw...

...Paul...

...On January 16, 1986, the U.S...

...Field trips take students from this small town to Min-neapolis's punk district or to John Ause runs a classroom where students never know what to expect...

...Giordano, who is now working with MNRC, estimates that DOE's presence has had ten times the impact of the Chernobyl disaster in terms of arousing citizen opposition to Maine Yankee...

...Pit-mining opponents continue to educate their neighbors through direct mail and leaflets, however, and Dave Sandidge of Citizens Against Destructive Mining is optimistic about the outcome of the vote...

...We climb into Floyd's truck for a tour...

...I've got four kids and I'm proud of every one...

...Instead, he supplements the standard texts with such works as Plato's Republic, the writings of Martin Luther, and the Federalist Papers...

...Scores of gold mines were opened in the Black Hills in the Nineteenth Century, including Homestake, America's largest underground gold mine, which began operations in Lead in 1876...

...Whole mountains are slated for destruction, and millions of gallons of water per week will be required for processing...

...He taught me history, but he was also the best English teacher I had because he taught me how to use words effectively...

...WISCASSET, MAINE "Nuclear power means nuclear waste means nuclear dumps, and the answer is still 'no.'" So says Garret Hotrich, who doesn't want Maine to be used for disposal of radioactive waste...

...Now he visits school classes after they visit the plant...

...His grandfather bought the house in the 1930s, and Floyd has lived all of his thirty-six years in the comforting shadow of the mountain he named, at age seven, "the top of the world...

...The veteran must handle even tougher questions from the class—such as, "How long did it take you to develop an irreverence for life...

...The assault that Floyd and other people in Lawrence County want to stop is open-pit gold mining and heap leaching...

...Olaf and became the first non-Mennonite in his county to register for the draft as a conscientious objector...

...In response, Governor George Mickelson granted a six-month hold on surface-mining permits and appointed a ten-member task force (including three representatives of citizens' groups) to draft regulations to control the industry...

...But there is hope...

...Massive earth movers and the heap-leaching process, combined with a gold price that's tripled in a decade, have brought a new wave of prospectors to the Black Hills...

...To them, to Floyd and Joe, as to most South Dakotans both Indian and white, the Black Hills are more precious than gold...

...Despite the display of good will on the part of dissidents and officials alike, most members of the Polish opposition are adopting a wait-and-see attitude to the publishing venture...

...Under such conditions, we will not publish a journal...

...Later, his quest for his own truths led him to the "para college" at St...

...Cynthia Orange (Cynthia Orange is a free-lance writer based in St...

...The same writer recognizes a dilemma Res Publica's official status may eventually pose to members of the editorial group, himself included...

...Aside from updates on illegal books in print, the journal carries essays on politics, history, and the philosophy of ideas, written by scholars, journalists, and creative writers who have published mostly in the Catholic and underground presses since 1981...

...They ask tough questions," says Dunning...

...The idea that the nuclear industry can make as much waste as it wants is un-American, undemocratic, and unpatriotic...

...Wharf has neither found the leak nor determined whether the cyanide is entering the ground water...

...For the time being, at least, the candor these writers insisted upon during their six years underground has surfaced in the light of day...

...Paul to witness a peace demonstration...

...It's hard to say, 'Stop...

...I guess that's what makes him such a good teacher...

...Bumping along mountain roads rutted by heavy trucks, we pass the giant refuse pile from Homestake's newly reopened pit mine...

...Just beyond Terry Peak, South Dakota's favorite ski area, we reach Wharf Resources' Foley Ridge mine and heap-leaching pad...

...Maine could be a bellwether for the nuclear-power industry," says Denman...

...Now, at $450 an ounce, they have to rip up the earth to make their millions...

...Jerry W. Wilson (Jerry W. Wilson is associate professor of journalism at Mount Marty College in Yankton, South Dakota...

...Projects here are unusual...

...We have the feeling that the range of our freedom of speech is getting broader and broader," says one of the writers, "but its frames are made of cement...

...Thanks to the Maine Nuclear Referendum Committee (MNRC), residents will vote in November on a proposal to ban the production of nuclear waste in Maine...

...But Res Publica focuses largely on Poland, proposing to move away from the polemics that characterize political and intellectual discussions here...

...Department of Energy blew into town and named two sites as potential high-level radioactive waste dumps," he says...

...He showed us another...

...Homestake alone filed more than 400 mining claims in 1986...

...They know the issues...

...He's not so much a teacher as he is a guide or helper...

...The Maine effort is only one of a growing and spontaneous movement nationwide to close nuclear reactors one by one, using a variety of issues and tactics...

...That waste heap filled one of the best berry-picking valleys anywhere...

...He really is the best teacher I've had...

...When Dunning went to the Bonny Eagle High School in Windham this spring, he was peppered with questions about nuclear waste, alternative energy, electric rates, and acid rain...

...We are going to disband.'" The magazine's future is hardly certain...

...Lenin might greet them, dressed in Russian garb but sounding peculiarly tike their absent instructor...

...He points to the establishment of ecological and peace groups following dissemination of information on these issues in both legal and independent publications...

...Floyd and Joe explain that most residents approve of underground mining but are upset by this massive surface destruction...

...They are just not good literature," he laments...

...In 111 years, Homestake has extracted thirty-five million ounces of gold—worth, at today's prices, $14 billion...

...Ause worries that many dedicated teachers are leaving their profession, frustrated by the obstacles that inhibit creative teaching...

...But Al Giordano, a Massachusetts activist who has been fighting nuclear power in New England for ten years, thinks everything has changed this time around...

...A lively discussion ensues...

...The result: 110 for shutdown, 13 for Maine Yankee...

...Coming Up from Underground WARSAW After a five-year publishing hiatus and two years of intensive negotiations with cultural authorities, Res Publica, a journal of the Polish underground, has gone on sale here as a legal, privately owned magazine...

...Bosclair, now a college student with a liberal-arts major, says John Ause made a real difference in the way he views the world: "Usually, we [students] only see one side of things...

...Seven companies besides Homestake and Wharf are exploring 41,000 acres of the Hills and seeking surface-mining permits...

...Many activists think closing one plant could start a chain reaction leading to other closures...

...Once you've given birth to a child, it's a shame to lose it," he says...

...Is Maine Yankee Headed for the Dump...

...Homestake moved fifty-seven families and bulldozed their homes to make room for this dump on the edge of Lead...

...Krol reports that the first two issues were approved with little difficulty and few deletions...

...Writers accustomed to the subterfuges of underground work stood on the balcony outside their cramped, two-room office, explaining their cumbersome distribution plan to a German television crew...

...But those groups are official, unauthentic," he claims...

...Earlier this year, the company launched a $200,000 public-relations effort to bring visitors, including schoolchildren, to the plant for educational tours...

...By agreement with the government, the editor/ owners have the right to purchase paper for 25,000 copies of their monthly, to use state-owned printing facilities, and to distribute through official channels...

...The vote is slated for October 20...

...For now, though, the atmosphere at the journal's editorial offices is heady...

...Intense efforts by industry lobbyists to get the legislature to reword the measure failed...

...Res Publica will carry regular reviews of current titles from the "independent" presses, although the publishers cannot be named...

...Meanwhile, People for Responsible Mining, an industry group, has launched a coun-teroffensive, intimidating petition-signers, seeking a judgment declaring the moratorium to be an unconstitutional taking of property, and threatening a legal challenge if the moratorium passes...

...All the authorities need do is block its official paper supply and it would cease to exist...

...As a result, their activity has no real effect...

...These teachers went into the profession to serve children and find themselves serving, instead, the institution," Ause says...

...Ause describes himself as more of an "academic coach" than a teacher and thinks that "what should go on in the classroom is learning, not teaching...

...But Bob Dunning, who works with Citizens Against Nuclear Trash, has asked schools to give him equal time...

...The county's three major newspapers, all owned by Sea-ton Publishing Company, cover the issue strictly from the industry's point of view and have stopped publishing letters from readers opposed to surface mining...

...Reactions to this move by General Wojciech Jaruzelski's regime range from optimism to skepticism...

...For his students, history is not just memorizing dates and facts—it's a thread of the past intertwined with events of the present and integrally linked to their own uncertain futures...

...They'll be on this side soon if we don't stop them," he says...

...Joseph Kriesberg (Joseph Kriesberg is an energy-policy analyst with Public Citizen's Critical Mass Energy Project and the author of "Shutdown Strategies: Citizen Efforts to Close Nuclear Power Plants...

...Floyd" is not the man's real name...

...South Dakota's mining laws, written principally in the Nineteenth Century to encourage the industry, are inadequate to control this onslaught...

...Off the list of taboo subjects, for example, is the underground itself...

...Since then, the committee has focused on building the financial and volunteer clout it will need to win, concentrating in particular on rural areas where concern about nuclear waste and its impact on the land run deep...

...According to editor Marcin Krol, a historian and writer long associated with the Catholic press, Res Publica's change in status indicates that the authorities "are trying to find a modus vivendi with the younger generation of intellectuals," who have largely aligned with the opposition since the 1981 declaration of martial law...

...He was granted his CO status...

...There are occasional pieces about China and Russia and miscellaneous reports from the West...

...You can say anything you want about the collapse of the economy or about the environmental crisis, but all this talking has little effect on our reality...

...When Homestake Mining and Wharf Resources began large-scale strip operations two years ago, some outraged residents began a guerrilla campaign, blocking roads and sabotaging equipment...

...Ause says the parochialism inherent in such a setting was a social and philosophical catalyst...

...Soon, the Citizens Against Destructive Mining and the Surface Mining Awareness Coalition formed to lobby the permit-granting county commission and to educate fellow citizens about this desecration of the Black Hills...

...It was an attempt to examine the liberal arts yet still deal with the undercurrent of discontent on campus...

...He says much of his philosophy and many of his approaches are drawn from his experiences in the 1960s...

...There's got to be something left in these hills for them...

...The magazine's official policy statement, in the premier issue, sounds even more positive...

...A victory will mean closing down the state's only reactor, Maine Yankee, a fourteen-year-old nuclear-power plant about twenty-five miles northeast of Portland on Montsweag Bay...

...By this process, Wharf extracts about 0.04 ounces of gold for every ton of mountain it moves...

...He spent his high-school days in Harmony, Minnesota, where his father was superintendent of the local school district, with its student population of 400...

...Gold mining has been a way of life in South Dakota's northern Black Hills for more than a century—ever since General George A. Custer reported the presence of gold in 1874...

...people perceive [Maine Yankee] as a nuclear-waste issue...

...The state government has been looking for a place to store low-level waste, and the Federal Government has picked the state as a possible site for a high-level waste facility, so there is reason for concern...

...Ause said you had some questions," announces the historical figure...

...MNRC collected more than 50,000 signatures in one day last year from people who wanted another chance to close the plant, thus qualifiying the petition for November's ballot...

...Open-pit gold mining is not new, but it has only recently become profitable again...

...After he left, the class held its own referendum on Maine Yankee...

...A bearded V.I...

...The creative approach to learning he employs in his classroom is not without costs...

...On another day, a Vietnam veteran visits Ause's class, posing tough questions to the students about how their thoughts, actions, and inactions might affect history and contribute to war or peace...

...Is it run by the people or the nuclear-power companies...

...This will mark the third opportunity Maine voters have had to close Maine Yankee by popular vote...

...When I was fourteen, I panned gold at $35 an ounce to buy school clothes," recalls Floyd's friend Joe...

...This was an experimental program loosely modeled on Oxford's tutorial system," he says...

...Ause does not rely on standard textbooks...

...But a man with a hammer and a sack of nails can't stop an international corporation for long...

...I've got to be able to take them up on the ridge and show them how to hunt where Grandpa taught Dad...

...On a hot afternoon in July, when staffers and supporters gathered to await delivery of the premier issue, they seemed somewhat taken aback by their own openness...

...People, he says, "are fed up with industry control and glad to have a say for once...

...The appearance of our journal in an essential way improves the atmosphere of the political life of our country," maintains the editorial collective...

...Monster trucks crawl from a yawning pit, adding their loads to a mountain of crushed rock...

...A mannequin in a hippie get-up, covered with buttons from the 1960s, stood by a model of the Kent State campus complete with grave markers commemorating the four students killed there in 1970...

...The Government challenged this request from a "mainline Lutheran" but, armed with letters of support from several members of the clergy, his high-school principal, and his father, a veteran of World War II, Ause prevailed...

...He got me into the swing of learning," says Gary Bosclair...