Vandiver Brown to Sumner Simpson on Dr. Gardner's Asbestos Dust Experiments (1937–1940)

Four letters from Vandiver Brown, Johns-Manville's general attorney, to Sumner Simpson, president of Raybestos-Manhattan, about the asbestos dust experiments that Dr. Leroy Gardner ran on animals at the Saranac Laboratory for a group of asbestos companies, with Gardner's "Interim Report on Experimental Asbestosis at the Saranac Laboratory." In February 1937 Brown listed the companies paying for the three-year work and what each would contribute. In May 1939 he asked whether Gardner's published references to asbestosis were proper, quoting the 1936 agreement that the results were "the property of those who are advancing the required funds, who will determine whether, to what extent and in what manner they shall be made public." In December 1939 he sent the interim report and asked whether Raybestos-Manhattan would help pay the $5,000 Gardner needed to finish, and in May 1940 he complained that Gardner was publishing conclusions "without seeking our advance approval."

What it shows

The letters are part of the Sumner Simpson Papers. Gardner had agreed in November 1936 that "the manuscripts of any reports shall be submitted for approval of the contributors before publication," and Johns-Manville supplied 1,200 pounds of asbestos fiber for the work. His seven-page interim report described exposing guinea pigs, rabbits, rats and cats to finely ground Canadian chrysotile at 145 million particles per cubic foot, which he noted was "29 times that set by the U.S. Public Health Service" for industry. Finely ground fiber produced little reaction, while longer fibers caused significant changes in guinea pig lungs, and Gardner concluded that the irritation from asbestos was "not chemical but mechanical in nature."

In Johns-Manville's index

Johns-Manville's legal department indexed the Motley 1,000 in 1984. Its index describes this document as follows:

Correspondence between J-M and Raybestos-Manhattan re Dr. L.U. Gardner's (Director, Saranac Lab) asbestos dust experiments on animals sponsored by the asbestos industry and re publication of the results. (1937-1940 1/)

Related documents

• Vandiver Brown to Sumner Simpson Enclosing Gardner's Interim Report (1939)
• Vandiver Brown to Sumner Simpson on Gardner Publishing Without Approval (1940)

About this copy

These are documents 16, 18, 20, 19 and 17 of the Motley 1,000, from the set the Manville Personal Injury Settlement Trust's records facility certified as true copies, pages CRMC-Motley1000-Subj-000452 to CRMC-Motley1000-Subj-000464.