So too are the stock images from the late 1940s and 1950s that show American housewives drenching their kitchens with DDT and children playing in the chemical fog emitted by municipal spray trucks. The army detail’s enthusiastic use of DDT is a familiar part of the pesticide’s postwar story. “It would be a good idea not to let the baby touch anything with DDT on it,” suggested the Lieutenant-and made his exit while I was still contemplating how my Korean vase with the four-toed dragon would look adorning the back of his head. We stood on the slippery floors and watched the kerosene dripping from the light fixtures. As Materi scrambled to carry the family’s clothes, linens, utensils, and food to safety, the team doused the home with a solution of kerosene and DDT. Fortunately, Materi had packed just the thing to address the problem: a grenade-shaped canister containing the new insecticide DDT, which she sprayed on high shelves, in dark corners, and under furniture and cabinets.Ī few days later the Materis received a visit from the army’s DDT detail: a lieutenant and a dozen men wearing white jumpsuits with large spray packs strapped to their backs. The couple and their new baby moved into a white stucco house with a red tile roof-and scores of nooks and crannies for insects to hide in. At the tail end of World War II, Irma Materi left Seattle for Korea to join her husband, Joe, an army colonel.
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