Asbestos Textile Institute Air Hygiene and Manufacturing Committee Minutes with H. M. Jackson's Respirator Paper (1957)

Two pages of minutes from the December 5, 1957, meeting of the Asbestos Textile Institute's Air Hygiene and Manufacturing Committee, attended by men from Johns-Manville (including H. M. Jackson, J-M's safety engineer), Raybestos-Manhattan, Keasbey & Mattison and other textile makers, with Jackson's three-page paper on respirators attached. Members compared card room dust counts, discussed reusing air from dust collectors, and agreed that new workers should get "correct information as to the nature of our industry" and that the medical and nursing professions should be told about "the conditions in our plants." Jackson's paper calls respirators "the last line of defense" against asbestos dust.

What it shows

Jackson's paper treats asbestos as "a particulate dust which is toxic through inhalation" and sets out an order of controls: eliminate, isolate, minimize, and only then protect the worker. Where dust could not be controlled by engineering, he wrote, respirators should be "a mandatory job requirement," and employees should be given enough knowledge of "the exposure and potential hazard" to appreciate the value of the device. He had made the same "last resort" point to J-M's Quebec plant in 1948 (Jackson to Morrison on respirators). The minutes also report that the Industrial Hygiene Foundation's study for the Quebec asbestos miners was finished but "not available" yet.

In Johns-Manville's chronology

Johns-Manville's own chronology of what the company knew describes this document as follows:

ATI Air Hygiene and Manufacturing minutes, 12/5/57, discusses the wisdom of using air exhausted from dust collection equipment.

Jackson's paper on the selection and use of respirators is discussed at ATI Air Hygiene and Manufacturing meeting on 12/5/57. Jackson states that respirators should be regarded as a last line of defense and should be mandatory in areas where exposure cannot be satisfactorily controlled by other engineering methods.