Children Playing on the Piles and Putting It in Their Sandboxes
The whole city did not know it was toxic.
The city of Picher, Oklahoma. A quiet place. Homey.
Lead and zinc mining was the main source of viability.
In 1913, as the Tri-State district expanded, lead and zinc were discovered on Harry Crawfish’s claim, and mining began. A town site developed overnight around the new workings and was named Picher in honor of O. S. Picher, owner of Picher Lead Company. The city was incorporated in 1918, and by 1920, Picher had a population of 9,726. Peak population occurred in 1926 with 14,252 residents and was followed by a gradual decline due to the decrease in mining activity, leaving Picher with only 2,553 by 1960. Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Picher,_Oklahoma
The discovery of the cave-in risks, groundwater contamination, and health effects associated with the chat piles (children playing on the piles and putting it in their sandboxes, as they did not know the toxic danger) and subsurface shafts resulted in the site being included in 1980 in the Tar Creek Superfund site by the US Environmental Protection Agency.