A. S. Rossiter of Asbestos Magazine to Sumner Simpson Sending an India-Rubber Journal Item on Respirators (1938)

A one-page letter of October 7, 1938, from A. S. Rossiter, editor of Asbestos magazine, to Sumner Simpson, president of Raybestos-Manhattan, sending a clipping from The India-Rubber Journal "concerning Industrial Respirators" that C. J. Stover, the magazine's publisher, thought he might find interesting. The item, by Philip Schidrowitz, summarized a British paper on the Mark IV dust respirator, which called dust suppression "one of the greatest industrial problems of the time" and mentioned the asbestosis caused by asbestos dust. The respirator's filter was a carded mixture of 20 percent chrysotile asbestos and 80 percent merino wool.

What it shows

The trade magazine's staff passed along items about dust and dust protection to Simpson. Here a respirator offered as protection against silica and asbestos dust used chrysotile asbestos in its own filter. Simpson's reply three days later (October 10, 1938) invited the magazine's editor and publisher to see Raybestos-Manhattan's dust control at its plants.

In Johns-Manville's index

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

03489. Transmittal letter for clipping from Indian Rubber Journal regarding Industrial Respirators.

03490-03491. Abstract of "Respirator for Use in Dust Laden Atmospheres" by Sadd, Green, Davies, Nicholson, Hill, and Watson. Gives details of the Mark IV Respirator and its uses. Informs that filtering material used is merino wool-asbestos, 20% chrysotile asbestos and 80% merino wool.

Related documents

• Sumner Simpson to A. S. Rossiter Inviting Asbestos Magazine to See Raybestos-Manhattan's Dust Control (1938)

About this copy

These are documents 03489, 03490-03491 of the Sumner Simpson Papers, as numbered in the collection's index.