Wheeler Protective Apparel

Wheeler Protective Apparel, Inc., of Chicago made safety clothing, including gloves, mittens, aprons, leggings, blankets and suits of asbestos cloth bought mainly from Southern Asbestos Company. In the 1980s it was a defendant in asbestos suits, including suits by former Union Carbide workers in which a Wheeler asbestos glove was at issue. The library holds no record of how the company ended.

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

History

A profile in Asbestos in October 1978, based in part on an article in H. K. Porter Company's magazine, traces the firm to 1913, when F. H. Wheeler was a founding partner of Wheeler Holcomb Company.¹ E. L. Wheeler, H. L. Wheeler's father, ran the business from 1918 as the F. H. Wheeler Manufacturing Company, and the present name came in 1947, when H. L. Wheeler, F. H. Wheeler's grandson, joined; H. L. Wheeler was president in 1978.¹ The magazine's earlier notice of December 1955, however, announced the death on October 31, 1955, of Edison L. Wheeler, whom it called the company's "founder and president."⁸ The two accounts differ on who founded the firm.

The 1978 profile says the company began as a maker of leggings and gloves and by then made safety apparel against chemicals, heat, fire, abrasion, impact and cuts, sold nationally through safety equipment distributors from its Chicago plant.¹² A shorter item in January 1979 repeated the company's history.⁹

Asbestos products

According to the 1978 profile, H. L. Wheeler told the magazine that the company began working with asbestos textiles in 1918.² Its gloves and mittens were made of asbestos textiles, aluminized fabrics, leather and other materials in over 50 styles.¹ Its "Wheeler-Weave" was a herringbone-weave asbestos fabric from Southern Asbestos, in a trademark color the company called Wheeler Green, and the profile says Wheeler used only Underwriters' Grade asbestos cloth, which it describes as about 80% asbestos.¹² The profile says Wheeler was one of the first companies to make a lighter "tropic weight" aluminized asbestos cloth, and that by 1978 practically all asbestos safety clothing was made of aluminized cloth, except certain gloves, mittens and blankets.²¹⁰

A product listing in the Sourcebook on Asbestos Diseases describes Wheeler products, as of 1952, as aprons, gloves, firemen's suits, blankets, capes, leggings and mittens.³ The library also holds a cloth label for the company's Fire King apparel; the trademark file gives first use of Fire King on March 21, 1955.¹¹¹² The label itself does not say what the apparel was made of.

What the documents show

In the 1978 profile, H. L. Wheeler said there was little to no danger in using the company's asbestos protective clothing, because the fiber is bound into the tightly woven fabric.⁴ He also said that Southern Asbestos's newer "Cleangard" treatment had improved the cloth and that handling the cloth properly let users stay within the OSHA rules; the profile adds that Wheeler's green dye reduced linting further.⁴ These are the company's own statements, published in a trade magazine.

In June 1986 Charles E. Hurt, a Charleston, West Virginia, lawyer, wrote to attorney Rebecca A. Betts that he represented Wheeler Protective Apparel in several cases brought by former Union Carbide employees alleging exposure to asbestos.⁵ He wrote that Wheeler had made a glove, Wheeler No. 4815, that was "apparently used by the claimants between 1956 and 1962."⁵ He asked whether Union Carbide had a sample, because he wanted an expert to examine one to show that wearing it "would not subject someone to asbestosis."⁵ He wrote that Wheeler no longer made the glove or had any in stock, and that the local distributor, Safety First Supply Co., had none either.⁵ He enclosed a Wheeler catalog page listing asbestos gloves in many lengths and styles.⁵ A second copy of the letter is also in the library.⁶

Wheeler also appears, with its lawyers, on the service lists of asbestos suits in Madison County, Illinois, in 1987 and 1989.⁷¹³

References

1. Asbestos, October 1978, p. 8
2. Asbestos, October 1978, p. 9
3. Wheeler (Wheeler Protective Apparel) product page
4. Asbestos, October 1978, p. 11
5. Union Carbide exhibit UC-439: Charles E. Hurt to Rebecca A. Betts Requesting a Sample Wheeler No. 4815 Asbestos Glove, with Wheeler Catalog Page (1986), pp. 1–2
6. Union Carbide exhibit UC-2363: Charles E. Hurt to Rebecca A. Betts Requesting a Sample Wheeler Asbestos Glove, with Wheeler Glove Catalog Page (1986)
7. North American Refractories Company's Notice of Compliance with Plaintiffs' Request to Produce in Madison County (1987), p. 55
8. Asbestos, December 1955, p. 56
9. Asbestos, January 1979, p. 42
10. Asbestos, October 1978, p. 10
11. Label: Fire King protective apparel (Wheeler Protective Apparel, Inc., Chicago) (1955), ACL Doc 20321
12. Fire King (Wheeler Protective Apparel) product page
13. North American Refractories Company's Supplemental Rule 220 Compliance in Bank of Alton v. A. P. Green Refractories (1989), p. 6

Asbestos products

2 products our documents name Wheeler Protective Apparel as making or selling. Each product's page says what the documents say about it, including its asbestos content.

• Fire King (Wheeler Protective Apparel)
• Wheeler (Wheeler Protective Apparel)

In our library

1 document in our library name Wheeler Protective Apparel, by collection.

Other library documents (1)

• Label: Fire King protective apparel (Wheeler Protective Apparel, Inc., Chicago) (1955) (publisher)

In the Union Carbide documents

Wheeler Protective Apparel is named in 2 Union Carbide documents dated 1986 (2 mentioned), from asbestos lawsuits over Union Carbide's Calidria asbestos. All are published in our collection.

• Charles E. Hurt to Rebecca A. Betts Requesting a Sample Wheeler No. 4815 Asbestos Glove, with Wheeler Catalog Page (1986) UC-439 (mentioned)
• Charles E. Hurt to Rebecca A. Betts Requesting a Sample Wheeler Asbestos Glove, with Wheeler Glove Catalog Page (1986) UC-2363 (mentioned)

Where this comes from

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