Customer Reviews

The Radioactive Boy Scout: The True Story of a Boy and His Backyard Nuclear Reactor

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(12)
3 star:		(8)
2 star:		(6)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

This book's title immediately caught my attention. Since I've been working in the nuclear field as a radiation dosimetry specialist for almost 30 years now, I couldn't help but to wonder what this young man could have done to be the subject of a book with such a title. So, I bought the book out of curiosity and read it with intense fascination. It became clear to me that this young man is gifted; and if his efforts could be properly focused, he could do great things. The book is a page turner. It is well written and in an engaging style. The author weaves a truly riveting story - and a true one on top of that. Unfortunately, the book has two shortcomings, i.e., the reasons for four stars instead of five. First of all, there are technical errors; here are only two examples: Roentgen discovered x rays in 1895 and not in 1896 as indicated on page 30; also, and more importantly, the statement on page 159 that beta particles from tritium can penetrate one or two centimeters of human flesh is grossly incorrect. In fact, the most energetic beta particles emitted by the tritium nucleus cannot even penetrate the skin's dead cell layer on the outer surface of the skin - they are simply not fast enough to give a radiation dose even to the skin, let alone deeper human flesh. The second shortcoming is the book's anti-nuke flavor. Tongue-in-cheek statements that tend to put into question the competence of engineers and scientists who are trying to improve the human condition should be replaced by statements that put as much emphasis on the successes and breakthroughs, as on the errors and misjudgments; otherwise a very misleading, erroneous and biased impression may be acquired by those simply wishing to learn the facts. At any rate, it is not my intent to belabor these points. This book presents a truly exciting story and will not disappoint; but by no means should it be used as an accurate historical or technical reference in nuclear science.

There's something not quite serious about The Radioactive Boy Scout. The book jacket has a cartoonish design and each page has a little atomic symbol by the page number. It's a small book, almost like a children's reader. It seemed to me as if it would be a quick, fun read.

Well, it was quick, all right. Author Ken Silverstein originally wrote this as an article for Harper's Magazine, according to the blurb. The article has been padded with several chapters on nuclear power, chemistry, and the history of the Boy Scouts. But The Radioactive Boy Scout is hardly a cartoon or a fun little story.

Although this is a story about how one teenager nearly built a nuclear reactor in his back yard, Silverstein wants us to know it is more than that. He emphasizes how David Hahn, the teenager, was neglected by his parents and not taken seriously by his teachers. If only someone had taken the time to take this boy under his wing, perhaps a near-disaster could have been averted. Certainly, the fact that there was no disaster takes the edge off the story, but unfortunately, we already know what can happen when teenagers don't get the attention they need.

I enjoyed the main story as well as the chapters on science and the Boy Scouts. Silverstein describes how radium-based products were sold in the early 20th century as tonics, lotions, and even suppositories, to improve one's health. He recalls filmstrips (remember?) and pamphlets that cheerfully told us to "duck and cover" in the event of a nuclear explosion. He uses a hilarious passage from P.G. Wodehouse to illustrate a common view of the Boy Scouts in their early days.

Although I share most of Silverstein's opinions on federal government, the nuclear power industry, the Boy Scouts, and inattentive parents, I think the story would have been more effective if he had left his editorial comments out. Describing David's father as "pathologically oblivious" is unnecessary. True, but unnecessary.

Mr. Silverstein has written a fascinating history of a young man's fixation on nuclear energy. The book was engaging, informative, and well-written.

My favorite element of the book was the excellent way in which Mr. Silverstein framed the story by putting it in the context of the history of nuclear science. The history of nuclear science was terrific. Mr. Silverstein clearly deserves praise for his thorough research and superb presentation of this material.

Unfortunately, Mr. Silverstein does not disguise his didain for the Boy Scouts of America and for nuclear energy. His negative opinions--in particular his frequent harping on the Boy Scouts--interrupted the flow of the book, and unnecessarily detracted from the story. Without this wart the book would be phenomenal.

The entire story is contained within parts of chapters 3, 7 and 8. Much of the rest of the book padding, or worse, Mr. Silverstein's political views. I came away with the sense that the story was actually no more than a vehicle by which the author could promote his negative views on the Boy Scouts and the nuclear industry.

As a physics and chemistry teacher, and a former Boy Scout, I can say with informed confidence that the author knows little about any of these topics. Silverstein for instance, describes lithium as the most reactive metal when in fact, of the alkali metals, it is the least reactive. The author describes sodium as being explosive in both air and water, when in fact sodium reacts with water to form hydrogen gas that will, if ignited, burn--the sodium itself just goes into solution as lye. In air sodium just tarnishes rapidly. The author also demonstartes his lack of understanding of the relationship between half-life and levels of radioactivity.

The actual story of the younster and his "nuclear reactor" is of only passing interest. Save your money; there's nothing here.

The story of David Hahn is interesting enough that it would be difficult to write a bad book about it. Fortunately, Silverstein's prose is breezy and well-written, and the book is quite the page-turner. Hahn is a near-perfect antihero - you know that he's clearly endangering himself and others, but at the same time, you can't help but cheer him on.

The story was initially an article in Harper's, which Silverstein then expanded on. This is pretty obvious, as lots of the book has little to do with David, but more to do with atomic energy and its history in the US. However, it's all pretty interesting stuff, and even though I already knew about most of it, I think that it would be quite educational for people who don't know as much about the US's history with the atom.

Now for the bad parts- Silverstein does a lot of moralizing, and it gets on my nerves.

He correctly judges David's parents as being neglectful - indeed, they do seem to treat David more as a burden then anything else. I also agree that his school should have done more to channel his energy in a positive direction. But what the hell - schools in America suck at this sort of thing, and everybody knows that. This is a problem that should be addressed, but you could hardly blame the school system for David's building a nuclear reactor.

Silverstein portrays David in a mostly sympathetic light, but he does judge him a bit harshly at times. I think this is unjustified - David carried out his experiments when he was still an adolescent. At that age, you really don't know right from wrong, which is why there's a different set of laws for people under 18.

Silverstein blames various adults for "not catching on" to what David was doing, and I think that's absurd. You can't expect that a teenager is going to build a nuclear reactor.

Finally, Silverstein seems to have a serious hate-on for nuclear science, and that really got on my nerves. Yes, the US does have sort of a dark history with nuclear science. However, is this the fault of the atom, or the fault of the US government? Last I checked, France gets 76% of their power from atomic energy, and they seem to be doing pretty well with it. Point being, you can discuss our past mistakes in atom-splitting without dismissing an entire branch of science.

Anyway, good book, you'll probably enjoy it, but you'll have to filter out some of Silverstein's gratuitous editorializing.

I was David's scoutmaster when he was preparing for his Eagle Scout Board of Review. I was to contact five registered adult Scout leaders, who would comprise the Board. One prospective adult told me he could not, because "something happened".

I learned that David and some friends were stopped by the cavaliering Clinton Township (Michigan) Police, who were randomly stopping teens and searching their cars for stolen tires.

David was not allowed to keep his experiments in his stepmother's home, so he kept everything in his car trunk. The cops found no tires, but saw his stuff and overreacted.

Days later, David's father phoned and said that David would no longer pursue the Eagle Scout rank.

A month or so later, a man claiming to be a reporter phoned my home, wanting to do a telephone interview about David. After a few moments, I refused. There was something negative about the line of questioning.

As a Scout, David was always clean-cut, polite, and well-liked by the other boys. My take is that David had the scientific curiosity of a Tesla or Edison; not of an evil prankster.

David's father, like so many divorced and re-married men, walked a tightrope between caring for his son and appeasing a new bride.

For Mr. Silverstein should keep his story factual, and keep his opinions about Scouting to the editorial pages.

I read this book through in two sittings. It was a fun and interesting read about a very unusual character and a very serious problem. The background information concerning the nuclear power industry was useful and helped fill in the context of the times and underline the seriousness of the danger. I didn't see the information concerning the safety and cost record of the nuclear industry as being political, unless recounting these issues, that are a matter of record, is now considered a political act.

I recently purchased a copy of "The Radioactive Boy Scout." I had read a Ken Silverstein's article in "Reader's Digest" about this teenager who created a nuclear reactor in his backyard shed. Having taken a few physics classes in college I was interested to learn more about this teenager. I grew up in Silicone Valley and attended high school in the early eighties. I had a friend who performed many of these same experiments. Our science fairs prizes were sometimes awarded to youth who had created electron microscopes or other endeavors, which to the uninitiated would seem beyond the abilities of a teenager.

Unfortunately Ken Silverstein not only falls into the category of the uninitiated but his writing is repetitive, his views are stereotypical and his book is an embarrassment to the anti-nuclear movement. Not only is he ignorant of the level of science experiments that are presented in high school science fairs, he has such a stereotypical view of scientists that he continually refers to David as a geek. Ken is truly surprised that David is not an ugly boy with thick glasses. It is clear that Ken has sophomoric view of the world.

Ken quotes a 2001 report from the International Energy Agency, "Nuclear power is currently being abandoned globally." It may have been abandoned by the western world, but both India and Pakistan have demonstrated bombs in the last decade. North Korea is rumored to be very close. Rather that providing a comparison with the bomb programs in Pakistan, India or North Korea, Ken spends a chapter in his book lamenting the fact that the founder of the Boy Scouts encouraged boys not to masturbate.

Realize that a boy in Detroit without the encouragement of his parents and living in a country that closely monitors radioactive material was able to enrich small quantites of highly dangerous material. There is an important story here, but the book the "Radioactive Boy Scout" is not it.

The book the "Radioactive Boy Scout" is short and tedious. If you read his article, you have already read the interesting parts.

After reading a positive review of "The Radioactive Boy Scout," I bought a copy without first scanning a few pages. Such a blind purchase is against my usual practice, because I have learned how overhyped many new books are. I found the book well-nigh unreadable because it is so poorly written and edited. It reads like breathless pulp fiction and is written at about that level of intellect. It contains numerous grammatical and other writing errors; they made me wince throughout the book. Moreover, the author seems to have had little real information about and even less understanding of the people involved. His analyses of them and the setting of the events are simplistic and cliched: the awfulness of the suburbs, the challenges to children of divorce, that sort of thing. (Do you think that the impressions of your high school teachers would help readers understand you?) The timeline is unintelligible, with a muddle of the concepts and events of more than five decades.

The book is described as having arisen from the idea of a publisher's editor, who contacted the author for an expansion after reading his initial article about the Boy Scout. That probably explains to a great extent why the book is so padded with pat recitations of the history of the nuclear age. I suspect that the review I read was prompted only by the reviewer's politics, which is unprofessional and unfair to readers.

All in all, the product seems to reflect little but laziness. That's a shame because an insightful and careful analysis of the case might have been a good contribution to the literature of the nuclear debate.

August 31, 1994, Clinton Township, Michigan police searched the trunk of a teenager's car expecting to find stolen tires. Instead, what they found was a lot of chemicals and powders and equipment that the teenager warned them was radioactive. In the ensuing investigation, American authorities quickly learned that the young man, David Hahn, was building his own nuclear breeder reactor for a Boy Scouts badge! In this remarkable story, author and journalist Ken Silverstein follows the life of Mr. Hahn, from his birth, through his mother's descent into mental illness, his parents' divorce, and his own monomania for investigating nuclear power.

This is quite a fascinating story. The author paints a gripping and also frightening story of a young man who is willing to break any rules to acquire the tools to make his own reactor, and just how close he came to doing so. I must admit to being absolutely amazed at what that young man accomplished!

On the down side, the author does leaven his story with a good deal of editorializing. He has many, many axes to grind (he dislikes nuclear power, Disney Corporation, right-wingers, "technological truimphalism" and most of all the Boy Scouts), and he uses this book as a convenient grindstone. But, on the up side, he does use the Notes section at the end of the book to clarify that much of this story is derived from David Hahn himself, and that he is not an entirely reliable source.

So, let me just say that I found this to be a great book, a gripping read, and a sadly cautionary tale. I highly recommend this book.