This day in history: Bunker Hill mine’s lead study showed less lead in the air than EPA’s; woman claimed cemetery lost her husband’s skull

From 1975: The Environmental Protection Agency and the Bunker Hill Co. were conducting separate studies showing how much lead the company’s smelter was releasing into the air – and the results diverged wildly.

The EPA’s preliminary date showed 9.1 micrograms per cubic meter of air.

The Bunker Hill’s data showed less than 5 micrograms.

When asked to explain the discrepancy, a company spokesman said the firm “uses different sampling methods” than the EPA.

An EPA spokesman said the agency would not comment on the issue until the monitoring project was completed and all of the raw data had been analyzed. An earlier study by the state of Idaho had also found lead levels higher than those reported by the company.

From 1925: A Colville woman filed an unusual lawsuit: She claimed that the Addy Cemetery had managed to lose her deceased husband’s skull.

Her lawsuit stated that her husband died in 1908 and was buried in the Addy Cemetery. About 16 years later, another man was buried in a cement vault which had been placed “in, over and upon” her husband’s grave.

She said that “part of her deceased husband’s bones and coffin” were strewn over the ground near the grave.

An investigation showed more bones underneath the cement vault, “but the skull was gone and has not yet been found.”

She was suing for $4,000.