Vandiver Brown to Sumner Simpson Enclosing Dr. Gardner's Report on Five Months of Asbestos Experiments (1937)

A one-page covering letter of September 23, 1937, from Vandiver Brown, Johns-Manville's general attorney, to Sumner Simpson, president of Raybestos-Manhattan, enclosing a copy of a September 21 letter from Dr. Leroy U. Gardner, director of Saranac Laboratory, "reporting further upon the progress of his experiments with asbestos dust." Acknowledging J-M's check for $1,250, "the third quarterly payment," Gardner reported that animals exposed for five months to about 175,000,000 asbestos particles per cubic foot of air had "plenty of particles in their lungs" and a fair number of asbestosis bodies, "but there is no fibrosis." Injection experiments with chrysotile, amosite, crocidolite and amphibole had failed to cause fibrosis outside the lungs, which with the inertness of particulate serpentine "suggests that asbestosis is largely due to mechanical irritation of the lung."

What it shows

This was Gardner's second report on the experiments that Johns-Manville, Raybestos-Manhattan and other asbestos companies were paying for at Saranac, following his first progress report of May 5, 1937. He said the absence of fibrosis was expected this early, since in his earlier experiment the reaction had appeared only after eighteen months, and that "It is too soon to speculate as to the significance of any observations thus far made." He added that if his very finely ground asbestos proved less active than longer fibers, it would strengthen the mechanical-irritation theory. Simpson sent the letter on to the Manheim plant two days later (Simpson to Weber, September 25, 1937).

In Johns-Manville's index

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

03354-03355. Transmittal letter for correspondence dated 9/21/37, informal progress report from Dr. Gardner.

03353. Acknowledges receipt of check for $1,250.00 to cover third quarterly payment for 1937. Informs that animals exposed to asbestos for 5 months have not yet developed fibrosis, but mentions this was anticipated. Injection experiments have not yet produced fibrosis. This causes speculation that asbestosis is caused by mechanical irritation not chemical property.

Related documents

• Leroy Gardner, First Progress Report on Asbestosis Experiments at the Saranac Laboratory (1937)
• Sumner Simpson to George R. Weber Sending Gardner's September Letter (1937)
• Sumner Simpson to Vandiver Brown on Gardner's Early Results and the Harvard Sample (1937)
• Dr. Leroy U. Gardner to Sumner Simpson on Difficulties with Intravenous Injection of Asbestos (1937)

About this copy

These are documents 03354-03355, 03353 of the Sumner Simpson Papers, as numbered in the collection's index.