J. F. D. Rohrbach to Vandiver Brown Renewing Raybestos-Manhattan's Saranac Pledge for 1941 (1941)

A one-page letter of January 14, 1941, from J. F. D. Rohrbach, vice president of Raybestos-Manhattan at Stratford, Connecticut, to Vandiver Brown of Johns-Manville. Because Sumner Simpson was "still away from the office due to the death of Mrs. Simpson," Brown's letter of December 12 had been referred to Rohrbach. He renewed the company's pledge of $1,000.00 for 1941, "payable $250.00 each quarterly period," and agreed "that much progress has been made, and if a method of treatment can be developed, the job will be very much worth while."

What it shows

Brown's letters of December 12, 1940 and January 3, 1941 asked the sponsors whether they would keep paying for Dr. Leroy Gardner's asbestos dust experiments at Saranac Laboratory. Raybestos-Manhattan stayed in at the same $1,000 a year. Rohrbach's hope for "a method of treatment" shows what the company expected the work might yield beyond its findings on the dust itself.

In Johns-Manville's index

Johns-Manville's attorneys indexed the Sumner Simpson Papers. Their index describes this document as follows:

Informs that RM will renew pledge to Saranac experimental work in the amount of $1,000 for year 1941. States S. Simpson away from office due to death of his wife. Agrees that much progress has been made, and if treatment can be developed, project will have been worthwhile.

Related documents

• Vandiver Brown to Sumner Simpson on the Sponsors Continuing Gardner's Experiments in 1941 (1941)
• Sumner Simpson's Secretary to Vandiver Brown Acknowledging His Letter on Gardner's Experiments (1940)
• Vandiver Brown to J. F. D. Rohrbach Acknowledging the 1941 Saranac Pledge (1941)
• J. F. D. Rohrbach to W. H. Dunn Forwarding the Saranac Pledge Letters and Gardner's Report (1941)

About this copy

This is document 04638 of the Sumner Simpson Papers, as numbered in the collection's index.