James Trepoy’s military patches and medals are displayed in February at his home in Salina. Trepoy, 88, is among an estimated 200,000 former soldiers who were exposed to high levels of radiation during and after World War II.

Salina ? The check stub and a notification letter rest in a file stuffed with Salinan James Trepoy’s military paperwork.

The sum — a whopping $75,000 — initially made Trepoy afraid to cash the check. Then he kept all the money in the bank for a time, fearing someone had made a mistake and he would get a call to send it back.

The letter accompanying the check looked official enough, bearing a letterhead from the U.S. Department of Justice, Civil Division, in Washington, D.C.

“This is to inform you that your claim for compensation under the Radiation Exposure Compensation Program has been approved,” the letter read.

Trepoy, 88, is among an estimated group of more than 200,000 former soldiers who were witnesses to above-ground and undersea atomic tests conducted between 1945 and 1963.

Nicknamed “atomic veterans,” the soldiers were part of the testing because various governments wanted to see if troops could operate on battlefields contaminated by radiation from nuclear bombs.

Retired veterans Larry Halloran, of Mulvane, and Gary Thornton, of Leon, have made it a mission to track down atomic veterans in Kansas, particularly older vets such as Trepoy, to make them aware of their eligibility for financial compensation from the government under the Radiation Exposure Compensation Program Act.

In 1990, Congress passed the act, offering veterans who took part in the tests a payment of $75,000 each.

Payments of $100,000 were offered to miners employed in above-ground or underground uranium mines scattered across the western U.S. Those working downwind of the Nevada test site were offered payments of $50,000.

“They’re called atomic veterans, but they should be called atomic guinea pigs,” Canadian lawyer Tony Merchant said recently.

Merchant represents a group of Canadian veterans who filed a class-action lawsuit in February seeking compensation from Canada’s government for their radiation exposure and resulting ailments.

Like many of the U.S. atomic veterans, Trepoy today has a taxing list of infirmities ranging from degenerative arthritis to a coronary artery bypass, diabetes and lymphoma (cancer of the lymph nodes), which was diagnosed after physicians noticed a skin rash on his back.

Lymphoma is one of 16 cancers the government presumes to be military service-connected if a veteran participated in a radiation-risk activity.

Trepoy relies on a power-chair for mobility. But more than 50 years ago, the then strapping young Army draftee was serving in the Philippines waiting to be sent with other allied forces to fight in Japan when the United States dropped bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, bringing about the end of World War II.

Trepoy and his unit were sent to Fort Polk, La., but his fascination and curiosity about the atomic bomb never ceased. When the call came in 1953 for volunteers to participate in nuclear testing, he volunteered.

He was a member of two infantry battalions that were to participate in one of 11 blasts as a part of Operation Upshot-Knothole in Nevada.

The National Association of Atomic Veterans Web site states there are now as many as 195,000 atomic veterans left across America who either don’t know that their oath of secrecy about their service has been rescinded, or are not aware of the potential monetary benefits due them for their radiation-induced illnesses.