Hello; It was a chemical used to clean big shorted out electric motors used in the area coal mines. After the chemical became too used to clean the motor parts it was dumped on the ground maybe 50 -100 yards from the river. The name escapes me just now. I want to say dioxins but do not have much faith in that recall.
An interesting thing was I managed a drive-in movie theater located beside the electric motor repair during the 1970's. We used well water to mix the soft drinks at the time. Was a popular place back then. All the wells in a four or five mile radius were not to be used. My house was on the outside edge of the affected area and i was told my water was not affected but I signed up to have the city water anyway as it ran past the house. It was cheaper to do it while they were laying the lines and would have cost a lot more later.
