Woman: You and your husband, of course, vigorously oppose the continuance of nuclear testing. Could you tell me a little bit about
that? What you have done?
Ava Helen Pauling: Well of course there's been no nuclear bomb testing for over two years.
Woman: Do you feel that you aided in some way?
Ava Helen Pauling: I think perhaps we did, a bit. I think when peopole learned that even the testing of these bombs was doing damage, not only
to themselves but to their unborn children, and to the future children, everyone realized that "This is foolish, we must put
an end to this." And as more and more people became aware of this, then they used enough pressure on their government so that
the governments themselves decided that there should be no more testing.
Woman: Sometime ago, Mrs. Pauling, I remember that your husband managed to get a petition on which were signed I believe, over 11,000
names of scientists in 49 countries to ban nuclear testing. Whatever became of that? As I recall, he was in some trouble with
the security, internal council.
Ava Helen Pauling: Well, it's true that in 1958 my husband did present to the United Nations a petition signed by over 11,000 scientists from
49 countries of the world, asking that the governments stop the testing of nuclear weapons and pointing out the damage that
even the testing of these weapons was doing to mankind. You know in that fall, then, of 1958, the governments stopped testing
weapons and the three governments - the United States, the USSR and Great Britain - met in Geneva to try and get a treaty
worked out which would ban the testing of nuclear weapons for all time. This has not yet been signed, but great progress has
been made. And that's one of the things that women could do, would be to insist that this agreement be signed.
