Letters Received to John J. Toohey, March 26, 1935

COLLINS & CORBIN COUNSELLORS AT LAW CLEMENT K. CORBIN ROBERT J. BAIN EDWARD A. MARKLEY CHARLES w. BROADHURST 1 EXCHANGE PLACE, HOWARD F. MC INTYRE JAMES B. EMORY JERSEY CITY, N.J. PATRICK F. MC DEVITT RAYMOND J. LAMB JAMES J. LANGAN JOHN F. LEONARD CHARLES H. SCHAFER ADOLPH s. RUMMEL EARLE J. HARRINGTON March 26, 1935. Re: United States Radium Corporation. John J. Toohey, Esq., Commissioner of Labor, Trenton, N. J. Dear Mr. Toohey: I represent the United States Radium Corporation, a corporation of Delaware which is duly authorized to transact business in the State of New Jersey, ha ving its principal office in this State at 15 Exchange Place, Jersey City, N. J. The registered agent upon whom process may be served is the Corporation Trust Company. A number of years ago my client had a plant or factory at 412 Alden Street, Orange, Essex County, New Jersey where it had what is known as an application plant in which it employed young women to paint watch and clock dials with luminous paint containing an infinitesimal amount of radium. This plant was closed voluntarily by the company when it appeared that there might possibly be an industrial ha zard consisting of an occupational disease known as rad ium poison- ing which might be caused by the ingestion of some of the paint by the young women when they pointed the brushes with their lips as they applied the material to the dials. By ingestion is meant the taking into the mouth of some of the material when the workers pointed the brushes with their lips. Thereafter, Dr. Harrison S. Martland, Chief Medical Examiner of Essex County went into the matter very thoroughly and quite definitely according to his judgment, established that there was an occupational disease known as radium poison- ing. Having-established the disease the dangers were recognized and the industry developed a technique which abolished the pointing of the brushes in the mouth and the danger of absorption of the material. Radium poisoning therefore, in the watch-dial industry has practically ceased to exist as an occupationel disease. In support of the foregoing statements I enclose a photostatic copy of a letter written by Dr. Martland to the United States Radium Corporation dated February 11, 1935. You will note that in this letter Dr. Martland says that he sees no reason why the United States Radium Corporation should not re-