Plant 666

Linda Milford's Barberton house is as much a memorial to the dead as it is a home to the living.

The family room's paneled walls are covered with poems about ascending to heaven, accompanied by photos of Linda's late husband, Fred. The pictures show him flashing playful smiles, his jaw lined with an Amish-style beard.

Depending upon the holiday, the 57-year-old widow decorates her TV hutch and end tables with cards Fred gave her throughout their 19-year marriage. Mother's Day cards are currently on display. "He was my special man," Milford says. "And he was taken from me too soon."

The tale of how she lost her husband begins on a warm September day in 1998. Linda was going about her daily chores. Fred was working at Summit County's wastewater treatment Plant 36, where he'd worked since the early '80s.

As the plant supervisor, Fred often caught flak from county higher-ups who thought him too friendly with the rank and file. He never asked his men to do something he wouldn't, says Linda. "They were our family. I'd always cook big meals and take them down to the plant for all the boys, or we'd set up big tables at home and they'd all come over on their lunch breaks. They were like his sons."

But on this day, Linda wasn't expecting them for lunch. So she was surprised to see Fred's truck pull into the driveway. She watched as Jimmy Graham, a plant worker, jumped out of the driver's seat and walked around to help Fred out of his truck. Linda knew something wasn't right.

She ran outside to help Graham carry Fred into the house. He shook violently, and his skin was clammy. "I'm so cold, and I've got a headache," he told her.

This was odd. Fred never got sick. "He was very healthy, always exercising and taking his vitamins," Linda says. "He hadn't been in the hospital, except to have his tonsils taken out as a kid."

Linda put him to bed, tucking him beneath layers of heated blankets. When he didn't stop trembling, she took him to the hospital.

The doctor diagnosed him with E. coli, most likely contracted from working with the sewage at Plant 36. He spent over a week in the hospital and another month on antibiotics.

In October, just when they started to think he was getting better, Fred woke Linda in the middle of the night. "I'm scared," he whispered to her. "I think it's coming back."

He was rushed to Akron General Hospital, his lungs full of fluid. A few weeks later, doctors discovered that the 60-year-old was suffering from more than E. coli.

A big knot in his groin revealed that he'd had cancer for years. It had spread throughout his body, working its way to his brain.

For the next five years, Fred endured operations, chemotherapy, and radiation. He continued to work until 2002, when he finally retired.

Over the next two years, Fred lost more than 70 pounds. Linda spent her days running him to doctors' appointments and cancer treatment. She nursed him as he recovered from two brain surgeries in 2003. But by the following year, their fight was over.

On April 15, 2004, Linda checked Fred out of the hospital so that he could die at home. She sat by his side, writing his obituary. He passed away 17 hours later.

Plant employees called Linda and offered to be his pallbearers. "They were so supportive," she says. "It just tore them up to watch Fred go the way he did. And then, when they all started getting sick -- something is just not right, I tell you. Something's wrong."

Indeed, not long after Fred got sick, most of his employees began to tumble into illness as well. Today, at least 10 of Fred's 15 workers have been diagnosed with cancer or other life-threatening diseases. One was only 34 years old. And none of it is a coincidence, they will tell you.

Welcome to Plant 36. Or, as employees sardonically call it, "Plant 666."

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You'd never know just by looking at it that Plant 36 was toxic.

It's tucked away in a quiet east Akron neighborhood, where dense woods surround neatly landscaped lawns, well-maintained homes, and a few charmingly weathered farmhouses.

Plant 36, also known as the Upper Tuscarawas Plant, does its best to blend in with its surroundings. The long, winding entrance ensures that it is well hidden. A glistening pond deflects attention from the sterile brick buildings and maze of white fencing. Even on a hot, muggy day, it doesn't have the heavy stench of most treatment plants.

Until July 1991, employees considered Plant 36 as harmless as it appeared.

They had recently begun using ferric chloride to treat the wastewater. But the tanks used to hold the metal-eating chemical hadn't been updated to accommodate it. The ferric chloride eventually ate through, spilling about 20,000 gallons of toxins into the ground.

"Mike," a 30-year-old maintenance worker, was asked to help contain the spill that day.