Dr. Paul Gross to Dr. Kenneth W. Smith on the Steve Grober Case and the Synthetic Silicates Report (1955)

A two-page letter of December 5, 1955, from Dr. Paul Gross, research pathologist of the Industrial Hygiene Foundation of America in Pittsburgh, to Dr. Kenneth W. Smith, Johns-Manville's medical director. Gross wrote that he had taken 45 photomicrographs in the case of Steve Grober, a former J-M worker, and was spending so much time on it "because opportunities to study asbestosis and this combination of pulmonary diseases are infrequent -- and I wish to learn." He offered a preliminary report and asked how J-M wanted his final report on "the synthetic silicates" prepared and presented to its "production men and other executives."

What it shows

The letter shows J-M's medical director using the Industrial Hygiene Foundation's pathologist both to review the lungs of a dead worker and to study the company's synthetic silicate products in animals. Gross proposed an hour's formal presentation of the silicates work, followed by open questions, and offered lantern slides of the photomicrographs. His full report on Grober's case, written later that month, is not published here because it is an autopsy report.

About this copy

The copy is marked as an exhibit to the deposition of Dr. Daniel C. Braun (Braun Deposition Exhibit 171A, April 28, 1981), and a handwritten note at the top refers to "autopsy work by Tr. Lab."