Mary P. Sinclair

Sinclair moved from Midland to Massachusetts in the late 2000s to be near her daughter, Rosemary. She died following a brief illness on January 14, 2011.

Her story was told in Mary Joy Breton's 2000 book Women Pioneers for the Environment, and the Catholic Church honored Sinclair and Helen Casey for their commitment to peace and the environment as "Jubilee Women" in 2000.

Women Pioneers For The Environment by Mary Jo Breton, .mw-parser-output cite.citation{font-style:inherit;word-wrap:break-word}.mw-parser-output .citation q{quotes:"\"""\"""'""'"}.mw-parser-output .citation:target{background-color:rgba(0,127,255,0.133)}.mw-parser-output .id-lock-free a,.mw-parser-output .citation .cs1-lock-free a{background:linear-gradient(transparent,transparent),url("//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/65/Lock-green.svg")right 0.1em center/9px no-repeat}.mw-parser-output .id-lock-limited a,.mw-parser-output .id-lock-registration a,.mw-parser-output .citation .cs1-lock-limited a,.mw-parser-output .citation .cs1-lock-registration a{background:linear-gradient(transparent,transparent),url("//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d6/Lock-gray-alt-2.svg")right 0.1em center/9px no-repeat}.mw-parser-output .id-lock-subscription a,.mw-parser-output .citation .cs1-lock-subscription a{background:linear-gradient(transparent,transparent),url("//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/aa/Lock-red-alt-2.svg")right 0.1em center/9px no-repeat}.mw-parser-output .cs1-ws-icon a{background:linear-gradient(transparent,transparent),url("//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4c/Wikisource-logo.svg")right 0.1em center/12px no-repeat}.mw-parser-output .cs1-code{color:inherit;background:inherit;border:none;padding:inherit}.mw-parser-output .cs1-hidden-error{display:none;color:#d33}.mw-parser-output .cs1-visible-error{color:#d33}.mw-parser-output .cs1-maint{display:none;color:#3a3;margin-left:0.3em}.mw-parser-output .cs1-format{font-size:95%}.mw-parser-output .cs1-kern-left{padding-left:0.2em}.mw-parser-output .cs1-kern-right{padding-right:0.2em}.mw-parser-output .citation .mw-selflink{font-weight:inherit}ISBN 1-55553-426-0, March 9, 2000

She was selected as Michigan's “Environmental Women of Action” in 1992 in a program sponsored by Tambrands which recognized one woman from each state.

The CBS newsmagazine 60 Minutes profiled her on January 27, 1985, and in 1990, she was inducted into the Michigan Women’s Hall of Fame.

Cracks in the containment building's foundation and sinking caused the Midland Nuclear Power Project to be abandoned in 1984 and a fossil-fueled plant was built instead. Sinclair turned her attention back to the problem of nuclear waste disposal and the federal government's failure to provide a comprehensive solution to the nuclear waste problem over several decades. In late 1992, the New York Times identified Sinclair as being "at the forefront of a battle...around the country, as utilities seek to build casks to hold the spent fuel" Nuclear plants were constructing 100-ton concrete-and-steel storage containers to hold nuclear waste on the same property where the reactors were located and close to large bodies of water. Sinclair and her network of activists wrote letters opposing this practice. She also testified at many public hearings on nuclear energy and authored numerous papers and articles.

In 1984, Sinclair was honored as one of 12 "Women of the Year" by Ms. Magazine. and she was one of the “Ten Michiganians of the Year” chosen by the Detroit News.

Sinclair campaigned for the Michigan House of Representatives from the 102nd District in 1980, but was defeated in the general election.

Sinclair continued her education at the University of Michigan earning a Master's degree, then taught and lectured on Energy and the Environment at UM from 1973 to 1978. She entered the Doctorate program in 1988. Six years later, at age 75, she was named a Doctor of Philosophy in the field of Environmental communications; specifically resource policy and environmental education.

She published the paper Nuclear Power and Public Concern in 1970. The document posed questions about nuclear power risks to government experts, scientists and academic scholars, and detailed their responses. She debated nuclear power safety with a Consumers Power Company vice president in 1974. Public Broadcasting Service carried the show nationally, and the transcript was printed in the Michigan Education Association's publication, Teacher’s Voice.

When Consumers Power announced their intentions to build the Palisades Nuclear Generating Station on the shoreline of Lake Michigan in 1967, Mary Sinclair's background in nuclear fission technology prompted her to write a letter to the editor questioning the safety of several elements of their plan.

She was born Mary Jean Palcich, raised in Chisholm, Minnesota where she was high school valedictorian, then graduated from the College of St. Catherine in St. Paul, Minnesota. Subsequently, she was a teacher and editor for Chemical Industries magazine. She worked as a librarian at the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C., where she met and married William Sinclair in 1945. After his graduation from Georgetown University Law Center, the couple moved to his previous home town of Midland, Michigan. Mary took a job as a technical researcher at Dow Chemical Company, and the couple had five children. She also worked for the Atomic Energy Commission as a technical writer, abstracting research reports

Mary P. Sinclair (September 23, 1918 – January 14, 2011) was an American environmental activist and "one of the nation’s foremost lay authorities on nuclear energy and its impact on the natural and human environment".