Asbestos History
Asbestos litigation history dates back to 1966, when the first asbestos lawsuit was filed on December 10, 1966, in Beaumont, Texas, by attorney Ward Stephenson on behalf of his client, Claude Tomplait. Mr. Tomplait had been diagnosed with asbestosis in July of that year. The defendants were eleven manufacturers of asbestos-containing insulation products, including Johns-Manville, Fibreboard and Owens Corning Fiberglass. A key precedent-setting asbestos lawsuit was filed on behalf of Reba Rudkin, who developed asbestosis after working for 29 years at the Johns-Manville manufacturing plant in Pittsburg, California. Asbestos Attorney Steven Kazan sued Johns-Manville in a civil lawsuit, even though Mr. Rudkin worked for Johns-Manville and the company would normally be protected from such a lawsuit because workers' compensation is the exclusive remedy for an employee suing an employer. But we argued that Manville and its executives should not be shielded from fraud and conspiracy charges.
In 1907, Dr. Montague Murray reported the a case of pulmonary fibrosis attributed to the inhalation of asbestos dust. Read more about The Dr. Montague Murray Case.
Nellie Kershaw was 13 years old when she began working at Turner Brothers Asbestos Company on a "roving" machine (used to twine threads of asbestos). By all accounts, Nellie's health was quite good when she began working at Turner, and began to decline when she was around 29 years old. At 29, she started treatment for a lung condition and "for 2 or 3 years her pulmonary symptoms waxed and waned but she continued to work. Read more about The Dr. Cooke and Nellie Kershaw Case.
In 1930, Dr. E. R. A. Merewether (Medical Inspector of Factories in England) and Mr. C. W. Price (Engineering Inspector of Factories) released their Report on Effects of Asbestos Dust On the Lung's Report ("Merewether Report".) Read more about the Merwether and Price Report.
Asbestos has a long history of use, dating back to the greeks at least and the hazards of asbestos weren't first known until the very late 1800's, in 1898 to be exact. Lucy Deane, a Lady Factory Inspector in Great Britain, filed a report that has become known as the first of its kind. In the report she noted:
The evil effects of asbestos dust have also attracted my attention, a microscopic examination of this mineral dust which was made by H.M. Medical Inspector clearly revealed the sharp, glass-like, jagged nature of the particles, and where they are allowed to rise and to remain suspended in the air of a room, in any quantity, the effects have been found to be injurious, as might have been expected. As in china-scouring, so in a still greater degree in other dusty trades, the worker may continue for a very long time apparently unaffected, before the symptoms of the evil become marked.
