Celebrating the life and legacy of Don't Waste MI board member, Corinne "Aunty Nuke" Carey (1926-2020)
Corinne "Aunty Nuke" Carey, 1926-2020Beyond Nuclear joins with Don't Waste Michigan and the greater Great Lakes anti-nuclear movement, in mourning the loss, and celebrating the life and legacy of work, of Corinne "Aunty Nuke" Carey. Corinne was a beloved friend and colleague, who recently peacefully passed on, surrouned by her loving family, on May 19, 2020, at age 93, after a long life, very well lived.
As described in her lovely and moving obituary*:
For years, she set up a table after church services [at the progressive Fountain Street Church, her "second home" where she attended for 72 years!] where she distributed literature about the importance of a nuclear free world and protecting our environment, and talked to everyone about what they could do to promote an environmentally safe Michigan. Long before anyone heard about reducing carbon footprints, Corinne was taking steps to reduce hers and encouraging others to do so. She practiced what she preached – every single day. On Monday afternoons, for many years, she rallied with a local peace group on the corner of Division and Fulton in downtown Grand Rapids, advocating for issues of peace, global justice, and a nuclear-free world.
Beyond Nuclear's Kevin Kamps, who is also from west Michigan, has been honored and privileged to serve alongside Corinne on the Don't Waste Michigan board of directors since 1993.
As her obituary shares:
She also grew increasingly interested in the environmental threat of nuclear power plants and joined the Don't Waste Michigan movement. In her late 60s, she walked 450 miles with the Michigan Peace March to protest against nuclear power plants and to fight for peace and justice around the world.
Don't Waste Michigan's first claim to fame, in the 1980s, was fending off multiple so-called "low-level" radioactive waste dumps, targeted at it by numerous other states. Corinne's involvement contributed to that important victory.
Corinne brought her bright, positive, energetic, creative spirit to every single board meeting, public hearing, and anti-nuclear rally she reguarly attended, over the course of many decades. She was well known for her handmade placards and street theater props and sculptures (including a human skeleton made from recycled plastic milk jugs, warning about the risks of radioactivity), which decorated countless events.
Don't Waste Michigan members celebrate the permanent shutdown of the Big Rock Point atomic reactor in August 1997. From left to right: Corinne Carey; Gary Karch; Kevin Kamps; unidentified local anti-nuclear watchdog; Eunice Hendrix; Michael Keegan. Photo by Gabriela Bulišová.Despite her sweet nature, Corinne could also courageously speak truth to power, never backing down. At the company's Orwellian "grand closure ceremony ... celebrating 35 years of succees," at the Big Rock Point nuclear power plant in Charlevoix, Michigan, in August 1997, Corinne remarkably managed to get a question in from the press pool, to Consumers Energy's CEO. She asked him about a very large-scale radioactivity release that Big Rock Point had emitted into the environment in the 1970s. Consumers Energy's CEO was dumbstruck, had no coherent response, and may in fact not have even known about the infamous, hazardous release. In that sense, Corinne helped preserve the institutional memory of the anti-nuclear movement, over the course of many decades. In fact, Big Rock Point was a extremely dirty and dangerous experimental reactor. Corinne spent decades watch-dogging it, and its sibling reactor, Palisades, in Covert, Michigan, and shining a bright spotlight of truth on them.
Corinne's ever present video camera is very likely how she "snuck" into that Big Rock Point press pool in the first place. She brought her camera to just about every Don't Waste Michigan event, board meeting, and rally she regularly attended. Her interviews with folks, on both sides of the issues, shown on Grand Rapids cable access t.v., were voluminous, constituting a steady drumbeat of her own do-it-yourself media coverage of the issues she cared so much about, spanning many years.
As her obituary relates:
Once retired from teaching, Corinne single handedly produced a series called Speaking Out on Grand Rapids Television and ran it for 20 years.
Reflecting her regard for children and the importance of education, Corinne taught elementary school students for 15 years.
As her obituary says:
Corinne returned to college in her early forties and, in 1967, became a member of the first graduating class at Grand Valley State University where she received a teaching degree. She taught fourth, fifth, and sixth grades at Coit School for the next 15 years. Corinne wanted students from Coit's economically depressed neighborhood to have pride in their community and in themselves. Toward that end, she organized and trained her students to lead kids in the lower grades on historical tours of the Coit neighborhood. They learned about the historic buildings and cobblestone streets around their school, as well as the origins of the neighborhood and its place in the history of Grand Rapids. For years after they graduated, students returned to her to say how important she had been in their lives.
Corinne will be sorely missed by so many who knew and loved her, as her obituary conveys:
For 35 years, she was an active member of the Institute for Global Education (IGE), an organization devoted to peaceful conflict resolution, human rights, and multicultural and religious awareness. Upon hearing of Corinne's passing, IGE released a statement saying that "…we have lost a jewel…Her enthusiasm and generous nature were a gift to everyone who was ever near her."
Corinne's environmental and Great Lakes protection activism lasted her entire long life:
At 91, Corinne joined the Michigan League of Conservation Voters as a volunteer where she spent her volunteer days calling Michiganders, encouraging them to vote for representatives who would stop rollbacks of critical environmental protections and work toward making Michigan a model and leader in conservation.
Kathy Barnes, best friends with Corinne, and a fellow, long-time Don't Waste Michigan leader, representing the Sherwood Chapter, shared that not long before she passed on, Corinne was on the phone to Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer's office, expressing concern about an Enbridge Canadian tar sands oil pipeline beneath the Straits of Mackinac, between Michigan's Upper and Lower Peninsulas, that is putting at risk the Great Lakes, drinking water supply for 40 million people in eight U.S. states, two Canadian provinces, and a large number of Native American First Nations. Prescient as ever, less than a month after her passing, news headlines announced alarming revelations of damage to that very pipeline, leading to a resurgence of urgent calls for its shutdown. (See a photo taken by Kathy of Corinne and anti-nuke friends at the bottom of this post.)
Her email address said it all, conveying her grandmotherly nature (she is survived by her four children, four grandchildren, and three great grandchildren, as well as a sister, a brother, and seven nieces and nephews), as well her as her lifelong activist streak, not to mention her sense of humor: AUNTYNUKE@aol.com. The anti-nuclear movement thanks her actual family for so very generously sharing Corinne with us all these many decades.
As her obituary concludes:
If Corinne could leave us with just one word, a word to remember her by, a word that we've all heard her say many times, it would be what she said with every goodbye: "Onward!"
(From Left to Right: David Kraft of Nuclear Energy Information Service of IL; Kevin Kamps of NIRS and Don't Waste MI; Corinne Carey of Don't Waste MI; and Corey Conn of NEIS of IL. Photo taken by Kathy Barnes of Don't Waste MI, in Chicago, IL, in the late 1990s, at a planning meeting for the Nuclear-Free Great Lakes Action Camps that would follow in 1999, 2000, and 2001. To see images from the 2000 Nuclear-Free Great Lakes Action Camp -- a protest and rally against the Palisades atomic reactor on the Lake Michigan shoreline in Covert, MI, click this link, and then look on the right hand margin of the website page.)
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*Please note, the August 8, 2020 memorial listed in the obituary has been postponed due to the pandemic. The memorial is now scheduled for August 14, 2021. It will be held at Fountain Street Church in Grand Rapids, MI.
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Corinne Carey's memorial has been re-scheduled for:
Saturday, August 21st, 2021
Fountain Street Church, 24 Fountain Street N.E., Grand Rapids, MI 49503