Metropolitan Life Insurance Company, A Study of Dust and Fume Hazards at Raybestos-Manhattan's Passaic Plant (1934)

A 79-page report by the Industrial Health Section of the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company on "the health hazards, if any, incident to the inhalation of dust and fumes" at the Manhattan Rubber Mfg. Division of Raybestos-Manhattan in Passaic, New Jersey, studied between September 24 and November 1, 1934. It describes how the plant made asbestos brake linings, brake blocks and clutch facings as well as rubber goods, gives dust counts and lead measurements for more than a hundred air samples, and ends with particle size graphs and photographs of the operations sampled. It found that "the dust counts are low with the exception of sample #4 in Department 53," an operation without exhaust, but that many samples held excessive lead.

What it shows

Most of the report concerns lead. It recommended exhaust hoods at the mixing, compounding and grinding operations, a mechanical way of dumping litharge (a lead compound), respirators where exhaust was not practical, and lunch rooms away from the departments using lead. It noted that a workman weighing out a mixture of asbestos, rubber and lead "is very careless" and wore a silica respirator, and that the man mixing asbestos and lead for abrasive wheels wore no respirator. On asbestos itself the report says only: "Asbestosis will be discussed in general report." Metropolitan Life sent two copies to Sumner Simpson, president of Raybestos-Manhattan, on January 3, 1935, and Simpson passed one to the company's chairman, writing that "there are several places where the dust count is very bad."

In Johns-Manville's index

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

"The Manhattan Rubber Mfg. Division of Raybestos-Manhattan, Inc., Passaic, N.J." Discusses results of study on dust levels and health hazards. Some areas of the increased use of respirators were recommended. Discusses problems associated with handling products and dusts containing lead.

Related documents

• Dr. W. J. McConnell to Sumner Simpson Sending the Passaic Plant Survey (1935)
• Sumner Simpson to A. F. Townsend on the Metropolitan Life Survey of the Passaic Plant (1935)
• Sumner Simpson to Dr. W. J. McConnell Acknowledging the Passaic Plant Survey (1935)
• A. F. Townsend to Sumner Simpson Acknowledging the Metropolitan Life Survey (1935)

About this copy

This is document 02045-02124 of the Sumner Simpson Papers, as numbered in the collection's index.