I really, really, really appreciate everyone's terrific responses to my post. Thank you! What a font of knowledge this list is!!

Pete Reinhardt, Yale EHS

 

Try Exploring the Dangerous Trades, by Alice Hamilton. Published in 1943, it's out of print but widely available used. There's not a lot on lab safety, but it's a compelling autobiography. Hamilton explored, documented and worked to correct dangerous working conditions in the first half of the 20^th Century. Hamilton was a product of Hull House, a peace and women's rights crusader, and an occupational physician. She was the first female faculty member at Harvard. Her family was equally remarkable. Her sisters were Dame Edith Hamilton, the renowned classicist, and Norah, a gifted artist, who incidentally illustrated her sister's book.

The other book you might try is Industrial Toxicology, which she co-authored with Harriet Hardy, an equally remarkable occupational physician.

Mike Wright

 

 

 

I would try to find a book or writings on or by Alice Hamilton who was a contemporary of this person and may have been at Harvard around the same time. 
Sammey

Colleagues,

 

With the wisdom of this listserve, I bet a few of you may provide some information on this topic.

 

A family member is writing a history of a relative who was a Harvard-educated dye chemist at a New England textile firm from 1906 until about 1930. At that time his health began to deteriorate and he "retired" from chemistry. He died in 1936 of liver cancer at 51 years of age.

 

Both she and I know it is highly speculative to associate his work and poor health, but she wonders what laboratory safety precautions might have been in common industrial use during that time. Do you know?

 

When I worked at the University of Wisconsin, a retired chemistry professor there told me that his first "gas mask" was purchased from army surplus prior to WW II. In my career, I've helped remodel labs with functional fume hoods dating from the 1920s. Were masks, gloves, hoods, etc. in common use in industrial labs between 1906 and 1930?

 

Perhaps there is a book that traces this safety history. If so, I'd appreciate hearing about it.

 

Thank you!

 

Pete

 

Peter A. Reinhardt

Director, Office of Environmental Health & Safety

Yale University

135 College St., Suite 100

New Haven, CT   06510-2411

(203) 737-2123

peter.reinhardt**At_Symbol_Here**yale.edu

 

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--- For more information about the DCHAS-L e-mail list, contact the Divisional secretary at secretary**At_Symbol_Here**dchas.org Follow us on Twitter **At_Symbol_Here**acsdchas

--- For more information about the DCHAS-L e-mail list, contact the Divisional secretary at secretary**At_Symbol_Here**dchas.org Follow us on Twitter **At_Symbol_Here**acsdchas