The Truth About Hollywood's Radioactive Movie Filmed in Utah

A disaster of a movie starring John Wayne and filmed in Utah wasn’t just a bomb for the studio, it was tragic for another kind of bomb. “The Conqueror” was filmed in 1956 during the same time nuclear testing was taking place in Nevada.

Movie Filmed in Snow Canyon Experienced Radiation

It was a movie about Genghis Kahn with John Wayne in the lead role along with Susan Hayward. The casting and acting weren’t good. It was so bad Howard Hughes, who was bankrolling the film, reshot some of the scenes back at the studio in Burbank.

To keep the scene consistent, Hughes hauled 60 tons of dirt and sand back to the studio in California. What he didn’t realize was that the sand was contaminated.

Scene from the John Wayne Movie and where it took places in Snow Canyon. https://youtu.be/OsNmE3ep4mA?si=o5XAepGBg-JFqBOV

At the same time as the movie was being shot, the U.S. Military was testing nuclear bombs across the state line in Nevada. Some of these tests brought radiation clouds over St. George contaminating the soil and especially in the canyons.

St. George Area and the Cast of the Film Experience Cancer Symptoms

After the nuclear tests, citizens of Southern Utah were concerned, but the Atomic Energy Commission assured al that it was safe. In the decades that followed, they found leukemia rates in Southern Utah were five times the average.

As for those who worked on the movie in Snow Canyon, medical ailments began to start showing up. By the end of 1980, 91 of the 220 people who had worked on the set had passed away from cancer including the director, John Wayne, and Susan Hayward.

You can see the locations from this video produced by Weekend Escapades:

In 1990 a law was passed to compensate those who had been down wind of the nuclear testing. Since that time over 2 billion dollars have been paid out to those affected by radiation.

Howard Hughes felt so guilty about what happened on the movie set that he bought up every print of “The Conqueror” so that the movie could never be seen again.