Dr. Kenneth Smith to H. F. Janson on Moving a Mill Worker Out of the Dust (1947)

A confidential note of January 21, 1947, from Dr. Kenneth W. Smith, the company doctor at Canadian Johns-Manville's mine at Asbestos, Quebec, to H. F. Janson, the mill's department supervisor, copied to the industrial relations manager. Smith writes that a recent examination of Alexandre Bourassa convinced him the man should be moved to a non-dusty job: "He is only 35 years of age but has had 20 years' dust exposure." Bourassa was "not sick at the moment," but if he stayed in the dust much longer, Smith feared "another case" with "a typical X-ray film and typical physical findings" of asbestosis.

What it shows

The note shows J-M's doctor at its main Canadian mine and mill treating long dust exposure as a known path to asbestosis, and using job transfers to head it off in individual men. The words "another case" suggest such cases were already familiar at the mill. The note concerns one man and says nothing about reducing the dust itself.

In Johns-Manville's chronology

Johns-Manville's own chronology of what the company knew describes this document as follows:

Dr. Kenneth W. Smith writes a note, dated 1/21/47, to H.F. Janson (Department Supervisor - Mill), regarding the transfer of Alexander Bourassa. Dr. Smith says that a recent physical exam of this man convinces him that, although Bourassa is "not sick at the moment," he should be transferred to a non-dusty operation. Bourassa is only 35 years old, but has had 20 years' exposure. "Should he continue to work in the dust much longer, I feel that we might have another case with 'a typical x-ray film and typical physical findings' of asbestoses [sic]."