Asbestos Podcast EP20 Transcript

Episode 20: The Less Said About Asbestos, the Better

Full transcript from Asbestos: A Conspiracy 4,500 Years in the Making — a 52-episode documentary podcast produced by Danziger & De Llano, LLP.

Episode Information
Series	Asbestos: A Conspiracy 4,500 Years in the Making
Season	1
Episode	20
Title	The Less Said About Asbestos, the Better
Arc	Arc 5 — The Conspiracy Begins (Episode 1 of 5 — Arc Premiere)
Produced by	Charles Fletcher
Research and writing	Charles Fletcher with Claude AI
Listen	Apple Podcasts · Spotify · Amazon Music

Episode Summary

On October 1, 1935, Sumner Simpson — president of Raybestos-Manhattan, the second-largest asbestos manufacturer in America — wrote a letter to Vandiver Brown, general counsel at Johns-Manville, the largest. Competitors, writing to each other about a shared problem: asbestosis. A trade magazine editor in Philadelphia had been asking questions for years, wanting to publish something about asbestos disease. Simpson's advice: "I think the less said about asbestos, the better off we are." Those words would appear in thousands of lawsuits and cost the asbestos industry billions. They survived because Simpson kept personal copies of his correspondence in a locked vault — approximately 6,000 documents that would not be discovered until 1977, forty-two years later. But the letter was not the beginning of the conspiracy. The beginning was 1929, when Anna Pirskowski filed the first asbestos personal injury lawsuit in American history against Johns-Manville. The case settled in 1933 for $30,000 split among 11 plaintiffs — approximately $2,727 each — while their attorney, Samuel Greenstone, was permanently barred from bringing future asbestos cases against the corporation. By 1935, the industry had established the full suppression template: settle cheaply, silence the attorney, edit the science, censor the trade press, and coordinate strategy between competitors. Dr. Anthony Lanza's 1935 study showing 87% fibrosis in workers with 15+ years of exposure had the sentence "It is possible for uncomplicated asbestosis to result fatally" deleted before publication at industry request. U.S. asbestos production increased 440% between 1930 and 1950 while these suppression strategies were in effect.

Key Takeaways

The First American Asbestos Lawsuit Established a Suppression Template. Anna Pirskowski and 10 other workers sued Johns-Manville in 1929 — the first asbestos personal injury lawsuit in American history. They split a $30,000 settlement ($2,727 each, approximately $68,000 in 2025 dollars), while their attorney Samuel Greenstone signed an agreement that he would never "directly or indirectly participate in the bringing of new actions against the Corporation." Competing Executives Coordinated Suppression Strategy. Sumner Simpson (Raybestos-Manhattan) and Vandiver Brown (Johns-Manville) — the two largest asbestos manufacturers in America — exchanged letters agreeing that "asbestosis receive the minimum of publicity." On October 1, 1935, Simpson wrote the defining document: "I think the less said about asbestos, the better off we are." Scientific Research Was Edited Before Publication. Dr. Anthony Lanza's 1935 study of workers at five asbestos plants showed 43% fibrosis at 5 years, 58% at 10-15 years, and 87% at 15+ years. Court documents confirm that Vandiver Brown and attorney George S. Hobart "suggested to Dr. Anthony Lanza that Lanza publish his study on textile workers with material alterations that would minimize the disease process and its seriousness." The sentence deleted: "It is possible for uncomplicated asbestosis to result fatally." Trade Press Complied with Censorship for Years. Miss A.S. Rossiter, editor of Asbestos magazine, wrote to Simpson: "Always you have requested that for certain obvious reasons we publish nothing, and, naturally your wishes have been respected." The industry praised her for suppressing disease reporting. "We Save a Lot of Money That Way." Charles Roemer, a former Unarco executive, described a meeting in the early 1940s where he asked Johns-Manville's Vandiver Brown: "Do you mean to tell me you would let them work until they dropped dead?" Brown replied: "Yes. We save a lot of money that way." 6,000 Documents Survived 42 Years to Prove Conspiracy. The Sumner Simpson Papers — locked in a vault at Raybestos-Manhattan, moved to a closet in Simpson's son's office after his 1953 death — were finally produced in 1977 during litigation discovery. A judge ruled they showed "a conscious effort by the industry in the 1930s to downplay, or arguably suppress, the dissemination of information to employees and the public for the fear of promotion of lawsuits."

Key Concepts

The Pirskowski Lawsuit and the Settlement Template

Anna Pirskowski worked at the Johns-Manville plant in Manville, New Jersey — a company town where Johns-Manville had moved in 1912, built a 186-acre facility, and at its peak employed 4,500 workers (40% of the town's workforce). She left in 1922 due to lung disease and filed suit in 1929, alleging the company "failed to provide a safe work environment with proper ventilation or protective masks." Her surname suggests Polish or Eastern European heritage, consistent with the immigrant workforce at Manville. Eventually eleven plaintiffs joined; their names do not survive in accessible records.

In November 1933, Johns-Manville's Executive Committee passed a resolution "authorizing the president of the Corporation to enter into negotiations for the settlement of any actions now pending or which may be hereafter brought against the Corporation by former employees founded upon alleged injury or disease resulting from their employment." This was not a one-time settlement — it was the creation of a system for handling future claims. The $30,000 settlement ($2,727 per plaintiff, approximately $68,000 in 2025 dollars) came with a gag order on attorney Samuel Greenstone that effectively ended his ability to practice asbestos law.

The Simpson-Brown Correspondence

The correspondence between Sumner Simpson and Vandiver Brown — executives at the two largest competing asbestos companies — demonstrates coordinated suppression across corporate boundaries. Simpson consulted Brown on how to respond to Miss Rossiter's requests to publish on asbestosis. His full letter read: "I think the less said about asbestos, the better off we are, but at the same time, we cannot lose track of the fact that there have been a number of articles on asbestos dust control and asbestosis in the British trade magazines. The magazine Asbestos is in business to publish articles affecting the trade and they have been very decent about not re-printing the English articles." Simpson praised Rossiter for self-censoring and framed the industry's position as reasonable rather than suppressive. This was not a single incident but part of an ongoing exchange in which competitors coordinated messaging about asbestos disease.

The Lanza Study and Scientific Censorship

Dr. Anthony Lanza (born 1884) was Associate Medical Director of the Industrial Hygiene Division at Metropolitan Life Insurance Company — "one of the discoverers of silicosis" with impeccable credentials. Starting around 1930, Lanza and colleagues studied workers at five asbestos plants and mines in the U.S. and Canada. The dose-response findings were definitive: 43% fibrosis at 5 years of exposure, 50% at 5-10 years, 58% at 10-15 years, and 87% at 15+ years. Court documents confirm that Johns-Manville attorney Vandiver Brown and George S. Hobart requested "material alterations that would minimize the disease process and its seriousness." The specific sentence deleted before publication: "It is possible for uncomplicated asbestosis to result fatally." By removing this sentence, the published version obscured the fact that asbestosis alone — without complications — could kill.

The Discovery of the Sumner Simpson Papers

Sumner Simpson kept personal copies of his correspondence locked in a vault at Raybestos-Manhattan headquarters. Simpson died in 1953. The papers stayed in the vault. In 1969, they were moved to a closet in his son's office. In 1974, moved again. In 1977 — forty-two years after the key letters were written — they were produced in response to a discovery request in a New Jersey lawsuit. The approximately 6,000 documents contained executive correspondence, research contracts, settlement agreements, and trade publication communications spanning the 1920s through 1940s. The judge who reviewed them wrote that they showed "a conscious effort by the industry in the 1930s to downplay, or arguably suppress, the dissemination of information to employees and the public for the fear of promotion of lawsuits." These documents became the foundation for most subsequent asbestos litigation and established that the industry's suppression was coordinated policy, not individual negligence.

Full Transcript

Opening — The Simpson Letter

Host 1: It's October 1, 1935. Bridgeport, Connecticut. Sumner Simpson is sitting at his desk at Raybestos-Manhattan — the second-largest asbestos manufacturer in America. He's writing a letter to Vandiver Brown, the general counsel at Johns-Manville.

Host 2: The largest.

Host 1: The largest. Competitors. Writing to each other about a problem they share.

Host 2: Asbestosis.

Host 1: A trade magazine editor in Philadelphia has been asking questions. Wants to publish something about the disease. Simpson has been telling her no for years. Now he's asking Brown for advice. And here's what he writes —

Host 2: Go on.

Host 1: "I think the less said about asbestos, the better off we are."

Host 2: Seven words.

Host 1: Seven words that would appear in thousands of lawsuits. Seven words that would cost the asbestos industry billions of dollars. Seven words that survived because Sumner Simpson kept copies of his correspondence in a locked vault — copies that wouldn't be discovered until 1977.

Host 2: Forty-two years.

Host 1: Forty-two years in a vault. And when attorneys finally got their hands on them, they found something worse than a single damning letter. They found a pattern.

Host 2: A pattern of what?

Host 1: Coordinated suppression. This is Episode 20: "The Less Said About Asbestos, the Better." Welcome to Arc 5: The Conspiracy Begins.

Sponsor Break

Host 2: This episode is brought to you by Danziger and De Llano. Thirty years of turning corporate records into family justice. Dandell dot com.

From British Reports to American Memos

Host 1: Arc 4 asked a simple question: "They knew — what did they do about it?"

Host 2: And the answer was... almost nothing.

Host 1: Narrow regulations. Two prosecutions in thirty-seven years. Production up sixty percent. But here's the thing about Arc 4 — it was mostly British. Merewether. Kershaw. Turner Brothers in Rochdale.

Host 2: And now we're crossing the Atlantic.

Host 1: Now we're crossing the Atlantic. Because while the British were writing reports and holding inquests, American executives were writing letters to each other. And they kept copies.

Host 2: So this arc is about what? Memos?

Host 1: Memos. Letters. Board meeting minutes. Settlement agreements. Research contracts with suppression clauses. The paper trail that proves it wasn't ignorance — it was policy.

Host 2: Policy.

Anna Pirskowski and the First American Lawsuit

Host 1: So let's start six years before that letter. 1929. Newark, New Jersey. A woman named Anna Pirskowski walks into a lawyer's office. She used to work at the Johns-Manville plant in Manville, New Jersey —

Host 2: Wait. The town is named Manville?

Host 1: The town is named after the company. Johns-Manville moved there in 1912. Built a 186-acre facility. At its peak, employed 4,500 workers — forty percent of the town's workforce.

Host 2: Company town.

Host 1: Company town. And Anna Pirskowski worked there until 1922, when she couldn't work anymore. Lung disease. She's filing a lawsuit — asking for $50,000 in damages.

Host 2: And this is the first?

Host 1: The first asbestos personal injury lawsuit in American history.

Host 2: What do we know about her?

Host 1: Almost nothing. Her surname suggests Polish or Eastern European heritage — consistent with the immigrant workforce at Manville. But her age, her immigration records, whether she had family, what happened to her after the settlement — none of that survives in accessible archives.

Host 2: The other plaintiffs?

Host 1: Eventually there were eleven. We don't have their names. Not in any publicly accessible record. They sued one of the largest corporations in America, and history didn't bother to write down who they were.

Host 2: That's part of the story, isn't it?

Host 1: That's always part of the story.

The Johns-Manville Settlement

Host 2: So what happened to the lawsuit?

Host 1: It dragged on for four years. And then, in November 1933, Johns-Manville's Executive Committee passed a resolution. I'm going to read it to you —

Host 2: From the board minutes.

Host 1: From the board minutes. Which survived. Quote: "authorizing the president of the Corporation to enter into negotiations for the settlement of any actions now pending or which may be hereafter brought against the Corporation by former employees founded upon alleged injury or disease resulting from their employment."

Host 2: So they weren't just settling this case.

Host 1: They were creating a system. A protocol for future settlements.

Host 2: And the numbers?

Host 1: $30,000. Split eleven ways.

Host 2: That's... twenty-seven hundred dollars. Per plaintiff.

Host 1: About $68,000 in 2025 dollars. Maybe two years' factory wages. For a lung disease that was going to kill them.

Host 2: If it hadn't already.

Host 1: We don't know how many of those eleven plaintiffs were still alive when the money arrived. What we know is what they gave up.

Silencing Samuel Greenstone

Host 2: The right to sue again?

Host 1: More than that. Here's what Samuel Greenstone — the attorney for all eleven plaintiffs — agreed to in exchange for that settlement.

Host 2: The attorney. Not just the plaintiffs.

Host 1: The attorney. Quote: He agreed that he would not "directly or indirectly participate in the bringing of new actions against the Corporation."

Host 2: Ever?

Host 1: Ever. He couldn't take another asbestos case against Johns-Manville. He couldn't refer cases to other attorneys. He couldn't consult. He couldn't advise. For the rest of his career.

Host 2: Do we know what happened to him?

Host 1: Samuel Greenstone. Newark attorney. After 1933... nothing. No newspaper mentions. No bar records. No obituary that's been found. The man who brought the first American asbestos lawsuit vanishes from the historical record.

Host 2: They didn't just silence the plaintiffs.

Host 1: They silenced the expertise. Greenstone had spent four years learning asbestos law. He knew the company's documents. He knew their defenses. He knew what discovery could uncover. And they bought all of that knowledge — and locked it away.

Mid-Episode Sponsor Break

Host 2: Speaking of corporate silence — Danziger and De Llano has spent thirty years finding the documentation companies thought they'd hidden. The settlement agreements. The internal memos. The gag orders. Nearly two billion dollars recovered for asbestos victims and their families. Dandell dot com — that's D-A-N-D-E-L-L dot com.

Miss Rossiter and Asbestos Magazine

Host 1: So it's 1935. The Pirskowski settlement is two years old. Greenstone is silenced. And in Philadelphia, there's a woman named A.S. Rossiter —

Host 2: A.S.?

Host 1: We don't know what it stands for. But we know she was a woman, because Simpson's letter refers to "Miss Rossiter." She was the editor of a trade magazine called Asbestos.

Host 2: The magazine was called Asbestos.

Host 1: Published since 1919 by Stover Publishing Company. "In business to publish articles affecting the trade."

Host 2: And she wanted to publish something about asbestosis.

Host 1: On September 25, 1935, she wrote to Sumner Simpson. And here's what she said — I'm quoting from the letter: "You may recall that we have written you on several occasions concerning the publishing of information, or discussion of, asbestosis and the work which has been, and is being done, to eliminate or at least reduce it."

Host 2: So she'd been asking for years.

Host 1: "Always you have requested that for certain obvious reasons we publish nothing, and, naturally your wishes have been respected."

Host 2: "Naturally."

Host 1: "Possibly by this time, however, the situation has sufficiently stabilized —"

Host 2: She's asking permission again.

Host 1: To publish in a magazine called Asbestos. About asbestos disease. And she needs permission from the industry.

The Simpson–Brown Correspondence

Host 2: And Simpson's response?

Host 1: He doesn't answer her directly. He writes to Vandiver Brown at Johns-Manville to coordinate their response. "As I see it personally, we would be just as well off to say nothing about it until our survey is complete. I think the less said about asbestos, the better off we are, but at the same time, we cannot lose track of the fact that there have been a number of articles on asbestos dust control and asbestosis in the British trade magazines. The magazine Asbestos is in business to publish articles affecting the trade and they have been very decent about not re-printing the English articles."

Host 2: "Very decent."

Host 1: They're praising her. For suppressing the news.

Host 2: And Brown's reply?

Host 1: Two days later. October 3, 1935. Quote: "I quite agree with you that our interests are best served by having asbestosis receive the minimum of publicity."

Host 2: Two companies. Competitors. Same language. Same strategy.

Host 1: And Miss Rossiter? In 1939, the publisher sent another letter confirming: "We understand that all this information on asbestos is to be kept confidential and that nothing should be published about asbestosis in Asbestos magazine at present."

Host 2: Four more years of nothing.

Host 1: At least. We have a letter from Rossiter in 1944 — still at the magazine. Still cooperating.

Dr. Anthony Lanza and the Redirected Science

Host 2: So that's the press handled. What about the science?

Host 1: The thing about suppression is — you can control a trade magazine. You can silence a plaintiff's attorney. But scientific research is harder.

Host 2: Harder to stop?

Host 1: Harder to stop. Easier to... redirect.

Host 2: Meaning?

Host 1: Dr. Anthony Lanza. Born 1884. Assistant Medical Director, Industrial Hygiene Division, Metropolitan Life Insurance Company. Before joining MetLife, he worked for the U.S. Public Health Service investigating why tuberculosis was killing Montana miners at ten times the national average. He examined over a thousand miners. Found hundreds with lung disease. Established the connection between silicosis and tuberculosis susceptibility.

Host 2: Legitimate scientist.

Host 1: Impeccable credentials. Special adviser to the government of Australia. Executive director of the National Health Council. Staff member of the Rockefeller Foundation's International Health Board. "One of the discoverers of silicosis."

Host 2: And Johns-Manville needed a study done.

Host 1: Starting around 1930, Lanza and his colleagues studied workers at five asbestos plants and mines in the U.S. and Canada. X-rays. Lung function tests. Four years of work.

Host 2: What did they find?

Host 1: Forty-three percent of workers with five years' exposure showed X-ray signs of fibrosis. Fifty percent with five to ten years. Fifty-eight percent with ten to fifteen years.

Host 2: And over fifteen years?

Host 1: Eighty-seven percent.

Host 2: That's... definitive.

Host 1: That's definitive. And it posed a problem.

Host 2: For the companies.

Editing the Galley Proofs

Host 1: In late 1933, Lanza recommended Johns-Manville perform dust counts at its plants. In 1933, a plant physician at a Johns-Manville facility in Illinois asked Lanza about hanging warning posters — to spread worker awareness of the health risks.

Host 2: And?

Host 1: Lanza objected. Because of the potential "legal situation."

Host 2: The scientist.

Host 1: The scientist. And then came the editing. On December 15, 1934, George S. Hobart — outside counsel for Johns-Manville — sent a letter to Vandiver Brown regarding edits to galley proofs of Lanza's study.

Host 2: They were editing the galley proofs.

Host 1: Before publication. Court documents confirm that Brown "and attorney George S. Hobart, together with Raybestos-Manhattan, suggested to Dr. Anthony Lanza that Lanza publish his study on textile workers with material alterations that would minimize the disease process and its seriousness."

Host 2: What got cut?

Host 1: One sentence. "It is possible for uncomplicated asbestosis to result fatally."

Host 2: That asbestosis could kill you.

Host 1: They removed the sentence saying asbestosis could kill you.

Host 2: And Lanza agreed?

Host 1: The study published in 1935. In Public Health Reports, Volume 50. Without that sentence.

We Save a Lot of Money That Way

Host 2: So. Settle quietly. Control the press. Edit the science. What else?

Host 1: Here's what Charles Roemer remembered. He used to work for Unarco — another asbestos company. In 1984, he gave a deposition describing a meeting in the early 1940s with Johns-Manville executives. He turned to Vandiver Brown — the same Vandiver Brown from the Simpson letters — and asked him directly: "Mr. Brown, do you mean to tell me you would let them work until they dropped dead?"

Host 2: And Brown said?

Host 1: "Yes. We save a lot of money that way."

Host 2: He said that.

Host 1: He said that. In a room with witnesses. Forty years before the deposition. And Roemer remembered.

Host 2: That's not ignorance.

Host 1: That's architecture.

Sponsor Break — Larry Gates

Host 1: $30,000 split eleven ways. Twenty-seven hundred dollars per plaintiff. For a disease that would kill them.

Host 2: And an attorney silenced forever.

Host 1: Larry Gates lost his father to mesothelioma in 1999. Dan Gates worked the Shell refinery in Pasadena, Texas. Came home every day covered in dust — dust his family breathed.

Host 2: Larry's 72 now. Still helping families navigate what his family went through.

Host 1: While fighting his own battle with cancer.

Host 2: Son of a victim. Advocate for hundreds of families. Cancer patient himself.

Host 1: That's who answers when you call Danziger and De Llano.

Host 2: Dandell dot com. That's D-A-N-D-E-L-L dot com. Nearly two billion dollars recovered. Over thirty years of experience.

Host 1: The industry said "the less said, the better." This firm has spent three decades saying more.

The Sumner Simpson Papers

Host 1: I should tell you how these documents survived. Because they almost didn't.

Host 2: The vault.

Host 1: The vault. Sumner Simpson kept personal copies of his correspondence — locked in a vault at Raybestos-Manhattan headquarters. Access was limited to himself, his son William, two secretaries, and security guards. Simpson died in 1953. The papers stayed in the vault. In 1969, they were moved to a closet in his son's office. In 1974, moved again to the Director of Environmental Affairs.

Host 2: And in 1977?

Host 1: Forty-two years later — produced in response to a discovery request in a New Jersey lawsuit.

Host 2: How many documents?

Host 1: Approximately 6,000. Twenty years of correspondence. Executive letters, research contracts, settlement agreements, meeting minutes, trade publication communications.

Host 2: Six thousand documents.

Host 1: And the judge who reviewed them wrote that they showed "a conscious effort by the industry in the 1930s to downplay, or arguably suppress, the dissemination of information to employees and the public for the fear of promotion of lawsuits."

Host 2: That's the ruling?

Host 1: That's the ruling. The documents became the foundation for most subsequent asbestos lawsuits. By 1978, the Washington Post reported legal claims totaled over $2 billion.

Host 2: And production during all those years?

Host 1: 1930 to 1950: production increases 440 percent.

Host 2: While the strategy holds.

Host 1: While the strategy holds. And it's going to get worse.

Preview — The Asbestos Textile Institute

Host 2: What's coming next?

Host 1: Episode 21: The Asbestos Textile Institute. Industry association forms. Coordinated suppression becomes institutional.

Host 2: So we're moving from individual letters to —

Host 1: To an organization. A structure. And after that, Episode 22: The Saranac Coverup. Multiple asbestos corporations fund research through a tuberculosis laboratory. Researchers find a link between asbestos and cancer. 1947 meeting decision: "There would be no publication of research without consent." "Objectionable material" defined as any relation between asbestos and cancer.

Host 2: Objectionable material.

Host 1: Any mention of cancer. Episode 23: The Animal Studies They Buried. 81.8% tumor rate in mice. Results hidden for decades. Arc 5 is the conspiracy documented. Not inference. Not "they should have known." The actual letters. The actual contracts. The actual meeting minutes where they agreed to suppress cancer research.

Host 2: 1935 to 1943.

Host 1: Eight years of paper trail. Next time: The Asbestos Textile Institute.

Closing

Host 1: October 1, 1935. Sumner Simpson writes thirteen words: "I think the less said about asbestos, the better off we are." But that wasn't the beginning. The beginning was 1929 — Anna Pirskowski walking into a lawyer's office. The beginning was the gag order that silenced Samuel Greenstone. The beginning was Miss Rossiter agreeing to publish nothing. The beginning was Dr. Lanza striking a sentence from his study.

Host 2: By 1935, it was just policy.

Host 1: By 1935, it was architecture. And the workers at the plants — the ones who came home covered in white dust, the ones their coworkers called "snowmen" —

Host 2: They had no idea.

Host 1: They had no idea. Because everyone who could have told them had been silenced, edited, or bought.

Host 2: Next time: The Asbestos Textile Institute.

Host 1: Arc 5 continues. We'll see you then.

Outro Banter

Host 1: Six thousand documents.

Host 2: In a vault. For forty-two years.

Host 1: What do you think Simpson was thinking? Keeping copies of everything?

Host 2: Insurance? Ego? The same instinct that makes executives save every email?

Host 1: The instinct that keeps plaintiff's attorneys employed.

Host 2: Exactly.

Host 1: "We save a lot of money that way."

Host 2: I can't get past that one. "We save a lot of money that way." Who says that out loud?

Host 1: A man who's never been recorded. Except he was. Forty years later.

Host 2: And Simpson — you suppress the science, silence the lawyer, gag the press, and then you keep six thousand documents in a vault with your name on it?

Host 1: These people were terrible at crime.

Host 2: I want "naturally, your wishes have been respected" on a throw pillow.

Named Entities

Historical Figures

Individual	Role/Affiliation	Significance
Anna Pirskowski	Former worker, Johns-Manville plant, Manville, NJ	Filed the first asbestos personal injury lawsuit in American history (1929); one of 11 plaintiffs who split $30,000 settlement
Samuel Greenstone	Attorney, Newark, NJ	Represented all 11 Pirskowski plaintiffs; permanently barred from asbestos litigation as condition of settlement; disappears from historical record after 1933
Sumner Simpson	President, Raybestos-Manhattan	Author of the defining October 1, 1935 letter; kept 6,000 documents in locked vault; died 1953
Vandiver Brown	General Counsel, Johns-Manville	Simpson's correspondent; coordinated suppression strategy; told Roemer "Yes. We save a lot of money that way" about letting workers die
A.S. Rossiter ("Miss Rossiter")	Editor, Asbestos magazine, Stover Publishing Company, Philadelphia	Self-censored disease reporting for years at industry request; wrote "naturally your wishes have been respected"
Dr. Anthony Lanza	Associate Medical Director, Industrial Hygiene Division, Metropolitan Life Insurance Company	Conducted 1935 study showing 87% fibrosis at 15+ years; study was edited at industry request before publication
George S. Hobart	Attorney	Together with Vandiver Brown, requested "material alterations" to Lanza's study to minimize disease severity
Charles Roemer	Former executive, Unarco	Gave 1984 deposition describing early 1940s meeting where Brown admitted letting workers die to save money

Organizations and Companies

• Johns-Manville Corporation — Largest asbestos manufacturer in America; defendant in Pirskowski lawsuit; employer of Vandiver Brown; operated 186-acre plant in Manville, NJ employing 4,500 workers.
• Raybestos-Manhattan — Second-largest asbestos manufacturer; Sumner Simpson served as president; headquarters in Bridgeport, Connecticut; source of the Sumner Simpson Papers.
• Unarco — Asbestos company; Charles Roemer's former employer; connected to the "dropped dead" deposition testimony.
• Stover Publishing Company — Philadelphia publisher of Asbestos magazine (since 1919); Miss Rossiter served as editor; complied with industry censorship requests.
• Metropolitan Life Insurance Company — Employer of Dr. Anthony Lanza; Industrial Hygiene Division conducted the 1935 asbestos worker study.
• Danziger & De Llano, LLP — Nationwide mesothelioma law firm producing this podcast series; recovered nearly $2 billion for families affected by asbestos exposure over 30+ years.

Locations

• Manville, New Jersey — Company town named after Johns-Manville; 186-acre facility; 4,500 workers (40% of town workforce); Anna Pirskowski's workplace
• Newark, New Jersey — Location of Samuel Greenstone's law practice; where Pirskowski lawsuit was filed
• Bridgeport, Connecticut — Raybestos-Manhattan headquarters; where Simpson wrote the October 1, 1935 letter
• Philadelphia, Pennsylvania — Location of Stover Publishing Company and Asbestos magazine

Notable Quotes

"I think the less said about asbestos, the better off we are." — Sumner Simpson, President of Raybestos-Manhattan, in letter to Vandiver Brown, October 1, 1935 "Yes. We save a lot of money that way." — Vandiver Brown, General Counsel of Johns-Manville, when asked if he'd let workers die rather than warn them (per Charles Roemer deposition, 1984) "Always you have requested that for certain obvious reasons we publish nothing, and, naturally your wishes have been respected." — A.S. Rossiter, Editor of Asbestos magazine, to Sumner Simpson, September 25, 1935 "[They] suggested to Dr. Anthony Lanza that Lanza publish his study on textile workers with material alterations that would minimize the disease process and its seriousness." — Court documents describing Vandiver Brown and George S. Hobart's intervention in the Lanza study "A conscious effort by the industry in the 1930s to downplay, or arguably suppress, the dissemination of information to employees and the public for the fear of promotion of lawsuits." — Judge reviewing the Sumner Simpson Papers, 1977

Timeline

Date	Event	Significance
1912	Johns-Manville moves to Manville, NJ; builds 186-acre facility	Creates company town; eventually employs 4,500 workers (40% of local workforce)
1919	Asbestos magazine begins publication by Stover Publishing	Trade publication later complicit in suppressing asbestosis reporting
1922	Anna Pirskowski leaves Johns-Manville plant due to lung disease	Worker forced out by illness years before filing suit
1929	Anna Pirskowski files first American asbestos personal injury lawsuit	First asbestos lawsuit in U.S. history; alleged failure to provide safe work environment
November 1933	Johns-Manville Executive Committee authorizes settlement system	Created protocol for future settlements, not just the Pirskowski case
1933	11 plaintiffs settle for $30,000; Greenstone agrees to gag order	$2,727 per plaintiff (~$68,000 in 2025 dollars); attorney permanently silenced
~1930-1935	Dr. Lanza studies workers at five asbestos plants	Finds 43-87% fibrosis rates depending on duration of exposure
1935	Industry requests "material alterations" to Lanza study	Sentence stating asbestosis could be fatal deleted before publication
September 25, 1935	Miss Rossiter writes to Simpson confirming years of censorship	"Naturally your wishes have been respected" regarding suppression of disease reporting
October 1, 1935	Simpson writes "the less said about asbestos, the better off we are"	The defining document — competitors coordinating suppression in writing
Early 1940s	Vandiver Brown admits "we save a lot of money that way"	Direct admission of policy to prioritize profit over workers' lives (per Roemer deposition)
1953	Sumner Simpson dies; papers remain in locked vault	6,000 documents of corporate correspondence preserved
1969	Papers moved to closet in Simpson's son's office	Documents physically relocated but still hidden from public
1977	Sumner Simpson Papers discovered during litigation discovery	42-year gap; judge finds evidence of conscious suppression
1984	Charles Roemer gives deposition about "dropped dead" conversation	40+ year memory of Brown's admission becomes court testimony
1930-1950	U.S. asbestos production increases 440%	Suppression strategy enabled massive production expansion

Statistics and Quantification

Statistic	Value	Context/Source
Pirskowski settlement total	$30,000	Split among 11 plaintiffs (1933)
Per-plaintiff settlement	$2,727	Approximately $68,000 in 2025 dollars
Number of plaintiffs	11	Including Anna Pirskowski; 10 others unnamed in accessible records
Johns-Manville Manville, NJ facility	186 acres	Employed 4,500 workers; 40% of town workforce
Fibrosis rate at 5 years exposure	43%	Lanza study X-ray findings
Fibrosis rate at 5-10 years	50%	Lanza study X-ray findings
Fibrosis rate at 10-15 years	58%	Lanza study X-ray findings
Fibrosis rate at 15+ years	87%	Lanza study X-ray findings; definitive dose-response relationship
Sumner Simpson Papers	~6,000 documents	Executive correspondence, research contracts, settlement agreements (1920s-1940s)
Years papers were hidden	42 years	1935 (key letters) to 1977 (discovery in litigation)
U.S. production increase 1930-1950	440%	During active suppression period
Mesothelioma latency period	20-50 years	Workers exposed decades ago still being diagnosed today
Available in asbestos trust funds	$30+ billion	For victims of occupational and secondary exposure
Average mesothelioma settlements	$1M-$2.4M	Range for qualified claimants
Episode runtime	~24 minutes	Transcript length

Frequently Asked Questions

When did corporations first know asbestos was dangerous?

By 1929, American asbestos companies knew enough to be sued. Anna Pirskowski's lawsuit against Johns-Manville alleged the company "failed to provide a safe work environment with proper ventilation or protective masks." The $30,000 settlement in 1933 — which included a gag order preventing further lawsuits — demonstrates the company understood its legal exposure. By 1935, executives at competing companies were coordinating suppression strategies, with Sumner Simpson writing "the less said about asbestos, the better off we are." For families affected by asbestos exposure, Danziger & De Llano has spent 30 years finding the documentation companies tried to hide.

What were the Sumner Simpson Papers?

The Sumner Simpson Papers are approximately 6,000 documents containing executive correspondence, research contracts, settlement agreements, and trade publication communications from the 1920s through 1940s. Sumner Simpson, president of Raybestos-Manhattan, kept personal copies locked in a company vault. They were discovered in 1977 during litigation discovery — 42 years after the most damning letters were written. A judge ruled they showed "a conscious effort by the industry in the 1930s to downplay, or arguably suppress, the dissemination of information to employees and the public." These documents became the foundation for most subsequent asbestos lawsuits.

Who was the first attorney to sue an asbestos company in America?

Samuel Greenstone, a Newark, New Jersey attorney, represented Anna Pirskowski and 10 other workers in the first American asbestos personal injury lawsuit, filed in 1929 against Johns-Manville Corporation. The case settled in 1933 for $30,000 split among 11 plaintiffs. As part of the settlement, Greenstone signed an agreement that he would not "directly or indirectly participate in the bringing of new actions against the Corporation." After 1933, Greenstone disappears from the historical record — no newspaper mentions, bar records, or obituary have been found.

How did asbestos companies edit scientific research?

Dr. Anthony Lanza's 1935 study of asbestos workers showed 87% of workers with 15+ years of exposure had radiographic evidence of lung fibrosis. Before publication, Johns-Manville attorney Vandiver Brown and George S. Hobart requested "material alterations that would minimize the disease process and its seriousness." The sentence "It is possible for uncomplicated asbestosis to result fatally" was deleted from the published version. Lanza also objected to posting worker warning signs at a Johns-Manville facility because of the potential "legal situation."

What is the connection between 1930s corporate suppression and mesothelioma lawsuits today?

The 20-50 year latency period for mesothelioma means workers exposed in the 1970s, 1980s, and even 1990s are still being diagnosed today. The documents proving corporate knowledge from the 1930s — particularly the Sumner Simpson Papers — establish that companies knew asbestos was dangerous decades before they stopped using it. This knowledge creates legal liability. Danziger & De Llano has recovered nearly $2 billion for asbestos victims using this documentary evidence. Over $30 billion remains available in asbestos trust funds for qualified claimants.

What compensation is available for mesothelioma victims?

Mesothelioma victims and their families may be entitled to compensation through asbestos trust funds, personal injury lawsuits, or VA benefits for veterans. Over $30 billion remains available in asbestos trust funds established by bankrupt asbestos companies. Average settlements range from $1 million to $2.4 million. Larry Gates, a Senior Client Advocate at Danziger & De Llano whose father died of mesothelioma, helps families navigate these options. For a free consultation, visit dandell.com.

External Resources

Government and Regulatory Sources

• OSHA Asbestos Standards — Occupational Safety and Health Administration
• EPA Asbestos Information — U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
• ATSDR Asbestos and Your Health — Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry
• NCI Malignant Mesothelioma — National Cancer Institute

Asbestos Exposure and Health

• Asbestos Exposure — Danziger & De Llano
• Asbestos Exposure Information — Mesothelioma Lawyer Center
• What Products Contained Asbestos? — Mesothelioma.net

Compensation and Legal Resources

• Mesothelioma Compensation Guide — Danziger & De Llano
• Asbestos Trust Funds Guide — Mesothelioma Lawyer Center
• Asbestos Trust Funds — Mesothelioma.net

Podcast Resources

• Episode 20: Less Said About Asbestos — MLNM podcast landing page
• Asbestos Podcast Hub — All episodes and series information
• Episode 20 on Apple Podcasts
• Episode 20 on Spotify

Series Navigation

Asbestos: A Conspiracy 4,500 Years in the Making — Arc 5: The Conspiracy Begins
Previous: Episode 19: Two Prosecutions	Episode 20: The Less Said About Asbestos, the Better (Arc Premiere)	Next: Episode 21: The Asbestos Textile Institute

Related Wiki Pages

• Asbestos_History_Timeline — Comprehensive timeline of asbestos from 4700 BCE to the 2024 EPA ban
• Asbestos_Occupational_Exposure_Quick_Reference — High-risk occupations and exposure statistics
• Asbestos_Trust_Fund_Quick_Reference — Compensation mechanisms for occupationally exposed workers
• Mesothelioma_Settlement_Quick_Reference — Settlement and verdict ranges for mesothelioma claims
• The_Asbestos_Podcast — Main podcast page with all episodes

About This Series

Asbestos: A Conspiracy 4,500 Years in the Making is a 52-episode documentary podcast tracing the complete history of asbestos from 4700 BCE to the 2024 EPA ban. The series is produced by Danziger & De Llano, LLP, a nationwide mesothelioma law firm with over 30 years of experience and nearly $2 billion recovered for asbestos victims.

Episode 20 opens Arc 5 ("The Conspiracy Begins"), which traces the shift from passive negligence to active corporate conspiracy. While Arc 4 documented British regulatory failure, Arc 5 moves to America — where executives at competing companies wrote letters coordinating the suppression of medical evidence, the censorship of trade publications, and the silencing of attorneys. The Sumner Simpson Papers, 6,000 documents hidden for 42 years, prove that this was policy, not ignorance.

Approximately 3,000 Americans are diagnosed with mesothelioma each year. Mesothelioma has a latency period of 20-50 years, meaning people exposed decades ago are still being diagnosed today. Over $30 billion remains available in asbestos trust funds for victims.

If you or a loved one were exposed to asbestos or have been diagnosed with mesothelioma, contact Danziger & De Llano for a free case evaluation. Call (855) 699-5441. Available seven days a week.