The Employers' Group Engineering Manual on Occupational Disease Hazards (1937)

A 58-page loose-leaf engineering manual of The Employers' Group, an insurance group, issued to its inspectors and dated June 1, 1937 (some pages carry revisions of June 1, 1938). This copy was charged to a supervisor in the group's Manchester, New Hampshire, office. It tells inspectors how to report on occupational disease hazards, industry by industry. Of asbestos it says: "In the opinion of certain authorities it is established that asbestosis may cause disability and death, and that any well defined case of asbestosis is very likely to progress to a fatal conclusion." It names insulation, brake lining and gasket manufacturing among the industries with this exposure.

What it shows

The manual is not consistent. Its schedule for asbestos goods manufacturing says asbestosis "is not considered to be as serious as silicosis" and "does not progress after exposure ceases." For control it recommends exhaust ventilation at the source, respirators where exhaust is impractical, and X-ray examination of new employees, but it says periodic examination of older employees "should be discussed with the Claim Department." The shipbuilding schedule says "It is not considered that there are any occupational disease hazards" there, apart from incidental work such as foundries and machine shops. The manual shows that by 1937 a major workers' compensation insurer was training its inspectors to look for asbestosis wherever asbestos dust was created.

About this copy

This is an insurer's manual, not a Johns-Manville paper, and the file does not show how J-M came to have it. J-M's own chronology describes a workers' compensation policy for 1937 to 1938 that the Employers' Liability Assurance Corporation, one of The Employers' Group companies, issued to J-M, so the manual may have reached J-M through that company, but that is a guess.

In Johns-Manville's chronology

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

Commercial Union Engineering Department manual shows sophistication re asbestos risks in factories but indicates shipbuilding is not hazardous. Undated portion notes risk to those sawing and cutting insulation and pipe covering.

Editor's note: J-M's description calls this a Commercial Union manual; every page reads "The Employers' Group, Engineering Manual." The undated portion on the risk to those sawing and cutting insulation and pipe covering is not in this file.