Asbestos Exposure Library

Here at Asbestos News we have developed an indexing system that is designed to assist people who are concerned about asbestos exposure, in the recent past or in previous decades. One of the insidious features of asbestos diseases is that often they do not become evident for decades after a person has been exposed to an asbestos hazard and either inhaled or ingested asbestos fibers. Our goal with the Asbestos Exposure Library is to provide a set of tools for individuals who have been impacted by asbestos or who have family members that have developed an asbestos related disease. These tools are designed to assist you in defining, as best you can, when and where that asbestos exposure may have occurred.

The Asbestos Library Archives

We have constructed portions of our website so that they are easily accessible, easily searched records for asbestos related activities of all sorts over the course of the Twentieth Century. You will find links on this page to those areas and when you arrive there, instructions on how best to find what you’re looking for. You’ll find some cross referencing here: there is no way to separate job sites with asbestos hazards from the jobs themselves or the products produced or utilized there. But we find that many people have fragmented memories of where they might have been exposed, for whom they were working or what exactly created the exposure to asbestos fibers. For that reason multiple indexes that might provide information can be used to piece together information from memories that stretch back many years. You can begin our search by perusing the various departments of our library as listed below.

1. Occupations: This section of the Library lists jobs that have proven to be hazardous occupations for generations of workers that had no idea they were being exposed to a major health hazard on a daily basis. In Twentieth Century industries, wherever there was heat involved in production work there was almost certainly going to be asbestos insulation in place, asbestos bricks or cement as part of the production facility, and asbestos clothing to protect workers. Tens of thousands of auto workers, steel workers, refinery workers and chemical plant workers alone were exposed to asbestos in this fashion. Our lists of occupations that are known to have been likely opportunities for exposure to dangerous asbestos fibers are listed in this section.
2. Asbestos Products: By some estimates there were over three thousand asbestos products in the marketplace during the 1950s when asbestos usage was at its height. Of course many of those products went into construction projects that are still homes or offices for people today. But construction workers installed asbestos roofing, pump assemblers installed asbestos packing, heating system installers insulated ducts with asbestos blankets – the list is expensive and so are the brand names. We have tried to include as much information on brands as possible, because often that can trigger a memory of a long past job assignment.
3. Veterans Exposure: It is estimated that thirty percent of the nation’s twenty five million veterans have been exposed to asbestos while on active duty. The preponderance of this exposure occurred during World War II and thereafter, when Navy ships were all still using asbestos extensively for insulation and fire protection purposes. Veterans from the Vietnam era have not been immune to asbestos exposure either, as it has taken the three branches of the military decades to clean up old barracks, bases and maintenance facilities that contain asbestos flooring and insulation, much of it in a deteriorated state before it was removed. Because of the pervasive exposure to asbestos experienced by Navy personnel, by GIs working with vehicles and equipment that used asbestos insulation, gaskets or protective devices and because of the extensive record of veterans who have developed mesothelioma we have devoted a number of sections to veteran asbestos exposure and veterans’ rights and services for treatment when an asbestos disease develops.
4. Shipyard Exposure: Probably the most hazardous industrial occupation for asbestos exposure has been shipyard work. The peak of the shipyard exposure and subsequent development of asbestos diseases occurred with shipyard workers during and after World War II. For forty years, from about 1930 on, every Navy ship commissioned used massive amounts of asbestos insulation in the engine room, as fire protection in the ship’s structure, for pumps and valves and insulation for hundreds of yards of pipe. The workers who installed, repaired or replaced this material were routinely exposed to asbestos fibers and have paid the price. We have an extensive list of shipyards that have a history of asbestos problems among former employees.
5. Asbestos Industries: This term refers to companies that routinely utilized asbestos products for assembly or manufacture of other products, or that used asbestos products as an active part of a production line thus exposing workers to asbestos fibers shed by moving parts. Our lists include breakouts by state of facilities known to have exposed workers to asbestos on the job; in most cases these sites have been named in one or more lawsuits by former employees who have developed asbestos related health problems. If you or a family member isn’t quite sure of the name of a former employer, you can search by city within a state and see if a company name or job location listed in our archives rings a bell. You’ll find duplications in these listings simply because some firms were known by more than one name, or were sold at some point: we have been repetitive in order to include all names that might trigger a memory.
6. Asbestos Companies: This section of the library is reserved for few hundred major firms that have been the target of most of the asbestos litigation over the past forty years. Hundreds of thousands of workers, veterans and family members of these individuals who were exposed to asbestos have filed suits against companies that were responsible for their asbestos exposure, and at least one hundred of those companies filed bankruptcy in order to protect themselves from massive liability. Our section on asbestos companies details those firms: the large firms that exposed thousands of workers over long periods of time and in many instances ignored repeated warnings about the health hazards occurring in their plants and factories.