Louis Hemerda to Dr. Paul Gross Sending Garfield Goins's Tissue Slides (1964)

A two-page letter of May 1, 1964, on Johns-Manville Products Corporation letterhead from Manville, New Jersey, from Louis Hemerda, J-M's supervisor of safety and industrial hygiene, to Dr. Paul Gross of the Industrial Hygiene Foundation of America. At Dr. Kenneth W. Smith's suggestion, Hemerda sends 32 tissue slides of Garfield Goins, a former employee who died suddenly on April 5, 1961, while being treated for active tuberculosis in a Veterans Administration hospital. Goins had worked for J-M from 1947 to 1958 in the Rigid Shingles Department, "where he had a moderate exposure to asbestos fibre, silica, and cement," and J-M's periodic X-rays from 1947 to 1957 were negative. J-M had been served with a dependency claim petition on behalf of his widow, "alleging that the characteristics of Mr. Goins' employment at Johns-Manville were responsible for his tuberculous condition."

What it shows

The letter shows how J-M handled a widow's compensation claim: its safety supervisor gathered the man's work history and hospital findings and sent the autopsy slides to the Industrial Hygiene Foundation's pathologist for his "interpretation." Gross's tentative reply two weeks later is his letter of May 15, 1964, and his formal report followed in October (covering letter of October 16, 1964).

About this copy

The file has a third page, a copy of the Veterans Administration hospital's "Final Diagnosis" with a summary of the autopsy findings. Under the Library's privacy rule that page is left out; only the two pages of the letter are shown.