Elliot Fairback to W. J. Hennessy Revising the North American Aviation Stonefelt Letter (1940)

A one-page letter of September 4, 1940, sent by air mail from Elliot Fairback at Johns-Manville headquarters to W. J. Hennessy at J-M's San Francisco office, about the draft letter to North American Aviation on "Stonefelt as a Health Hazard" that Vandiver Brown had written (Brown's text of August 28). Fairback had wired that day, "HOLD UP WRITING NORTH AMERICAN LETTER," and now gave two changes. He struck the words "this material and" so that the letter claimed thirty years' experience only "with materials of substantially similar composition," and he changed the statement about Dr. Fairhall's tests to say they used mineral wool "made from the same type of raw materials" as Stonefelt.

What it shows

Both changes narrowed what the letter claimed for Stonefelt itself: J-M would no longer say it had decades of experience with the product, or that the Harvard tests were on its basic ingredient. Fairback also directed that future inquiries on the subject be referred to headquarters "for individual handling." A year later Brown's draft for Douglas Aircraft again claimed "nearly forty years experience with this material" (the Douglas Aircraft answer).

In Johns-Manville's chronology

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

Letter regarding JM Stonefelt product as a health hazard, drafting response to inquiries about whether the product causes rashes or lung problems

Related documents

• Elliot Fairback and Vandiver Brown on Answering North American Aviation About Stonefelt (1940)