Quigley Company, Inc

Quigley Company was a New York maker of refractory products for steel mills, power plants and refineries, best known for Insulag, an asbestos-containing insulating cement, and for Panelag. Pfizer bought Quigley in 1968, Quigley stopped making its asbestos products in 1973 or 1974, and it sold its operating assets in 1992. Quigley filed for bankruptcy in 2004, and a plan approved in 2013 set up the Quigley asbestos trust.

Draft. The history on this page was written from the documents in our library and has not yet been reviewed by a person.

History

Court opinions in our library say Quigley was founded in 1916.¹³ A 2010 bankruptcy opinion describes it as a maker of refractory products used mainly in the iron, steel, power generation, petroleum, chemical and glass industries.³ Refractories are materials that keep their strength at high temperatures.⁵

The library's earliest mention of a Quigley product is in the trade magazine Asbestos in August 1926. A profile of an insulation contracting firm listed, among the materials it carried, "Quigley Furnace Specialties Company's Hytempite."⁶ The library does not show how that firm name relates to the later Quigley Company, Inc.

A Quigley product sheet for Insulag in our library gives the company's name as Quigley Company, Inc., "Manufacturers of Industrial Specialties," at 527 Fifth Avenue in New York.⁷ A drawing of an Insulag bag shows a 75-pound sack marked as made by Quigley Company of New York.⁸ Insulag was made at a Quigley factory in New Jersey; a Maryland appeals court names that factory's former plant manager as Louis Killian (spelled Kilian in other records).⁹ A 1963 patent for a refractory insulating and sealing compound, by Raymond J. Demaison, was assigned to Quigley Company, Inc., "a corporation of New York."¹⁰ Barry Castleman cites that patent in his chapter on alternatives to asbestos insulation.¹¹

In 1968 Pfizer acquired all of Quigley's shares, and Quigley became a wholly owned subsidiary.¹ The Washington Supreme Court quoted Pfizer's aim as to "establish[] a position in refractory specialties."¹ According to Pfizer, Quigley went on running its own plant, buying its own raw materials and handling its own sales after the purchase.¹ After 1968 Quigley's marketing materials, stationery, invoices and data sheets carried the Pfizer name or logo, and post-1968 bags named Quigley as maker and Pfizer as parent company.¹

The 2006 and 2010 bankruptcy opinions describe the 1992 asset sale differently. The 2006 opinion says Pfizer sold substantially all of Quigley's assets to Minteq International, Inc., with Quigley and Pfizer keeping the asbestos liability.¹² The 2010 opinion says Quigley sold substantially all of its operating assets in September 1992 to Specialty Refractories, Inc., which then transferred them to Minerals Technologies, Inc.³ The 2006 opinion says that after the sale Quigley's only function was managing asbestos claims; the 2010 opinion says Quigley operated no business from the sale until just before its bankruptcy.¹²³

Asbestos products

Quigley's best-known product was Insulag. The product sheet calls it "refractory plastic insulating lagging."⁷ A 2015 federal decision says Quigley created and trademarked Insulag in 1936 and that it then contained chrysotile asbestos.² The Washington Supreme Court wrote that Quigley trademarked Insulag in 1936 and Panelag in 1945.¹ A 2011 federal decision describes Insulag as an insulation that could be used in high-heat settings such as steel-mill blast furnaces.⁵

The court records give different time spans for the asbestos content. The 2011 decision says some Quigley products, including Insulag, contained asbestos from the 1930s through the early 1970s.⁵ The 2010 bankruptcy opinion says Quigley made and sold three asbestos-containing products, Insulag, Panelag and Damit, between the 1940s and the 1970s, and that it stopped making asbestos-containing products in 1973 or early 1974, citing Louis Kilian's testimony.³ The Washington Supreme Court says Insulag and Panelag contained asbestos until 1974, when Quigley stopped selling them and replaced them with asbestos-free versions.¹ A Maryland appeals court names the replacement as "Insulag AF," a non-asbestos cement.⁹

Insulag went to large industrial buyers. The Maryland court said Quigley had supplied Insulag to Bethlehem Steel's Sparrows Point plant, by Quigley's own interrogatory answer, from 1955 until 1960 and again from 1967 until 1974.⁹ In Rublee v. Carrier Corp., the Washington Supreme Court described workers at Puget Sound Naval Shipyard using Insulag and Panelag on steam turbines in the 1960s and early 1970s.¹

What the documents show

Warnings and marketing. In a 2011 decision, a federal court summarized the position of a law firm suing Pfizer: that Insulag packaging carried no asbestos warning, and that Quigley marketing material bearing the Pfizer logo described the product as "not injurious." The court was reciting that law firm's brief, not making a finding.⁵

Quigley's own trial exhibits. In 2000 Quigley was a defendant in a Brazoria County, Texas, asbestos case alongside Armstrong World Industries, CertainTeed, Union Carbide, United States Gypsum and T&N, and one law firm, Powers & Frost, filed the defendants' pretrial papers.¹³¹⁴ Quigley's own exhibit list in Moake v. Owens-Corning Fiberglas (Brazoria County) named a Quigley publication titled "OSHA and Asbestos," dated December 12, 1972, and a notice on discontinuing the manufacture of Insulag and Panelag dated January 2, 1974.¹⁵ The list also named correspondence with the New Jersey Department of Labor and Industry and the New Jersey Manufacturers Insurance Company, and depositions of Louis Kilian and of Dr. Joseph L. Pentecost from 1991.¹⁵ Our library holds the list, not those documents. Quigley also appears among the defendants in a 1989 Illinois case file, Bank of Alton v. A. P. Green Refractories.¹⁶

Joint claims handling. The 2010 bankruptcy opinion recounts that Quigley and Pfizer joined the Wellington Agreement in June 1985, under which the Asbestos Claims Facility handled their claims, and later the Center for Claims Resolution, which they left in July 2001.³ The same opinion says they took part in the class settlement that the U.S. Supreme Court overturned in Amchem Products, Inc. v. Windsor.³¹⁷

Pfizer's name on the product. After the bankruptcy, people exposed to Insulag sued Pfizer as an "apparent manufacturer," because its name and logo were on the bags and papers. In In re Quigley Company (2011), a federal court held that these claims were not covered by the bankruptcy injunction.⁵ Later courts differed on the merits. In Sprague v. Pfizer (2015) a federal court in Washington granted Pfizer summary judgment.² In Stein v. Pfizer (2016) a Maryland appeals court held that Bethlehem Steel, a sophisticated buyer, knew it was buying Insulag from Quigley, not Pfizer.⁹ In Rublee v. Carrier Corp. (2018) the Washington Supreme Court held that the question was how an ordinary consumer would see the product, found the evidence could go either way, and reversed and remanded for further proceedings; four justices dissented.¹

Bankruptcy and trust

Quigley filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in the Southern District of New York on September 3, 2004.¹² The courts put the number of asbestos suits against it at more than 160,000; the 2010 opinion counts 411,100 claims asserted against Quigley, with Pfizer also named in 280,343.⁹³ Before the filing, Pfizer settled with most of the claimants against it; the 2006 opinion puts the settlement at about $430 million with more than 80% of the claimants, while the 2010 opinion counts about sixty-six agreements covering roughly 175,000 claimants for $450 million in all.¹²³

The case took nine years. In 2006 the bankruptcy court ruled on how the claimants' votes would be counted.¹² In 2010 it refused to confirm Quigley's fourth plan. Bankruptcy Judge Stuart M. Bernstein found that Pfizer had settled with about 175,000 claimants in deals tied to confirmation, and he held that the plan "was proposed in bad faith since it was designed to achieve acceptance through a tainted vote."³ In 2013 the federal district court approved a reorganization plan creating an asbestos trust under section 524(g), with an injunction channeling claims against Quigley, and claims against Pfizer based on its ownership of Quigley, to the trust.¹

Our trust page reports that the trust was funded with more than $700 million.⁴ Details of what it pays are on the Quigley trust page.⁴

References

1. Rublee v. Carrier Corp. (Washington Supreme Court, 2018)
2. Sprague v. Pfizer, Inc. (W.D. Wash. 2015)
3. In re Quigley Company, Inc. (Bankr. S.D.N.Y., September 8, 2010)
4. Quigley Asbestos Trust Claims
5. In re Quigley Company, Inc. (S.D.N.Y., May 17, 2011)
6. Asbestos, August 1926, p. 6
7. Advertisement: INSULAG (Quigley Company), ACL Doc 15270
8. Label: INSULAG (Quigley Company), ACL Doc 15031
9. Stein v. Pfizer Inc. (Maryland Court of Special Appeals, 2016)
10. Refractory insulating and sealing compound (US Patent 3,092,505, 1963), p. 1
11. Reading Castleman, Chapter 6
12. In re Quigley Co. (Bankr. S.D.N.Y., August 9, 2006)
13. UC-1658: Defendants' Line and Page Designations of Deposition and Trial Testimony in Moake v. Owens-Corning Fiberglas (2000), p. 1
14. UC-1657: Powers & Frost, L.L.P. to Brazoria County District Clerk Transmitting Defendants' Pretrial Filings and Exhibit Lists, Moake v. Owens-Corning Fiberglas (2000), p. 2
15. UC-1657, p. 98 (Quigley Company, Inc. exhibit list)
16. North American Refractories Company's Supplemental Rule 220 Compliance in Bank of Alton v. A. P. Green Refractories (1989), p. 3
17. Amchem Products, Inc. v. Windsor (U.S. Supreme Court, 1997)

Asbestos trust

If you or a family member worked with or around Quigley Company, Inc's asbestos products and later developed mesothelioma or another asbestos disease, a claim may be paid by Quigley Asbestos Trust Claims. Free case review.

Asbestos products

1 product our documents name Quigley Company, Inc as making or selling. Each product's page says what the documents say about it, including its asbestos content.

• Insulag (Quigley)

Court cases

19 court decisions in our case-law library name Quigley Company, Inc as a defendant, newest first.

• Rublee v. Carrier Corp. (2018)
• Rublee v. Carrier Corporation (2017)
• Rublee v. Carrier Corp. (2016)
• Stein v. Pfizer Inc. (2016)
• Sprague v. Pfizer, Inc. (2015)
• In re Quigley Company, Inc. (2011)
• In re Quigley Company, Inc. (2010)
• In re Quigley Co., Inc. (2008)
• In re Quigley Co., Inc. (2007)
• In re Quigley Co., Inc. (2007)
• In re Quigley Co. (2006)
• Pritchett v. Asbestos Claims Mgt. Corp. (2002)
• Dykstra v. AP Green Industries, Inc. (2001)
• Amchem Products, Inc. v. Windsor (1997)
• Georgine v. Amchem Products, Inc. (1996)
• Georgine v. Amchem Products, Inc. (1994)
• Bushless v. GAF Corp. (1990)
• Smith v. Bethlehem Steel Corp. (1985)
• Beshada v. Johns-Manville Products Corp. (1982)

In our library

2 documents in our library name Quigley Company, Inc, by collection.

Other library documents (2)

• Advertisement: INSULAG (Quigley Company) (publisher)
• Label: INSULAG (QUIGLEY COMPANY) (publisher)

In the Union Carbide documents

Quigley Company, Inc is named in 10 Union Carbide documents dated 2000 to 2003 (10 mentioned), from asbestos lawsuits over Union Carbide's Calidria asbestos. All are published in our collection.

• Defendants' List of Potential Deposition and Trial Testimony, Moake v. Owens-Corning Fiberglas Corp., Brazoria County, Texas (2000) UC-1660 (mentioned)
• Powers & Frost, L.L.P. (Sharla J. Frost) to Brazoria County District Clerk Jerry Deere Transmitting Defendants' Pretrial Filings and Exhibit Lists, Moake v. Owens-Corning Fiberglas (2000) UC-1657 (mentioned)
• Defendants' Line and Page Designations of Deposition and Trial Testimony in Moake v. Owens-Corning Fiberglas (2000) UC-1658 (mentioned)
• Defendants' General List of Medical, State-of-the-Art, Economic, Liability and Damage Experts, Moake v. Owens-Corning Fiberglas (2000) UC-1659 (mentioned)
• Defendants' Exhibit List with General Exhibit List in Villarreal v. GAF Corporation Holdings, Inc., et al., Cameron County, Texas (2001) UC-2009 (mentioned)
• United States Gypsum Company's Responses to Standard Interrogatories in Karal v. Atlas Turner, Inc., with Exhibits 1-9 (2001) UC-5456 (mentioned)
• Defendants' Motion to Bifurcate Punitive Damages in Villarreal v. GAF Corporation Holdings, Inc., et al. (2001) UC-2004 (mentioned)
• Defendants' List of Potential Deposition and Trial Testimony in Villarreal v. GAF Corporation Holdings, Inc., et al. (2001) UC-2007 (mentioned)
• Defendants' Line and Page Designations of Deposition and Trial Testimony, Villarreal v. GAF Corporation Holdings, Inc., et al. (2001) UC-2008 (mentioned)
• Affidavit of Susan W. Gilefsky Attaching U.S. Gypsum and Georgia-Pacific Interrogatory Responses (2003) UC-5449 (mentioned)

Names in the documents

The spellings documents use for Quigley Company, Inc, OCR misreadings included, so a search for any of them finds this page: Quigley Company.

Where this comes from

This page brings together every document in our library that names Quigley Company, Inc, across collections. Titles and affiliations are taken from the documents themselves, and units and subsidiaries are grouped under the company they belong to.