National Insulation Contractors Association, Safety Reminders (1972)

A pocket-size, 38-page safety booklet for insulation workers, "Safety Reminders," prepared by the National Insulation Contractors Association's Occupational Health & Safety Committee, chaired by Don Bradshaw of Owens-Corning Fiberglas, in response to the Occupational Safety and Health Act. Besides general advice on clothing, tools, scaffolds and ladders, it has sections on fabrication shops, mixing cements, "Spraying Asbestos Fiber Insulation" and "Insulation Removal, Cleanup and Disposal." It tells workers to "wear the approved respirator suitable for asbestos and silica dusts" during handling, spraying and cleanup, to "mix cements containing asbestos in the bag" or in a booth with dust collection, and to wet insulation before removing it.

What it shows

The booklet notes that "asbestos-containing materials require good health safety handling practices whenever material dust is present," and advises workers to vacuum their coveralls and leave them at the work site, and not to wear dusty clothes "to and from work or around home." The 1971 and 1972 committee lists include contractors and associate members from Johns-Manville Sales Corporation, Armstrong Cork Company and Asbestospray Corporation. J-M later cited its part in preparing the booklet in its interrogatory answers (see Johns-Manville Standard Interrogatory Answer on Health Information Given to Customers and Employees, with a Program Order Form (c. 1977)).