Asbestos: A Conspiracy 4,500 Years in the Making
They knew. They always knew.
Nearly 2,000 years ago, Roman historian Pliny the Elder documented asbestos workers dying from "sickness of the lungs"—watching slaves fashion crude respirators from animal bladders while weaving what he called "funeral dress for kings." The people closest to the dust understood the danger. The people farthest away admired the spectacle, collected the profits, and buried the evidence. That pattern never changed.
Asbestos: A Conspiracy 4,500 Years in the Making traces humanity's 4,500-year relationship with the mineral the ancient Greeks named "asbestos"—meaning indestructible. From Stone Age Finnish pottery (2500 BCE) to the $70+ billion in legal damages paid by modern corporations, we uncover how a material praised for safety became a source of sickness, litigation, and grief.
Each episode explores:
- Ancient origins: The salamander myth that persisted for 2,000 years, the Roman tablecloths that cleaned themselves in fire, the sacred flames kept burning with asbestos wicks
- The industrial cover-up: Internal documents proving companies knew asbestos caused cancer since the 1930s—and suppressed the evidence for 40 years
- Modern consequences: Why mesothelioma claims 3,000 American lives annually, and why $30+ billion sits in asbestos trust funds waiting for victims who never file
- The science of denial: How manufactured doubt delayed regulation for decades, using the same tactics as the tobacco industry—sometimes with the same scientists
Whether you're a history enthusiast, legal professional, medical researcher, or someone seeking answers after asbestos exposure, this podcast reveals the uncomfortable truth: the longest-running industrial cover-up in human history isn't ancient history. It's still happening.
The History of Asbestos Podcast is sponsored by Danziger & De Llano, a nationwide mesothelioma law firm with over 30 years of experience and nearly $2 billion recovered for asbestos victims.
If you or a loved one has mesothelioma, visit Dandell.com for a free consultation.
Asbestos: A Conspiracy 4,500 Years in the Making
Season 1 Preview: Inside The 4,500-Year Asbestos Conspiracy
Between 1930 and 1980, asbestos was used in more than 4,000 consumer products—from the fake snow in “The Wizard of Oz” (1939) to toasters, hair dryers, crayons, ironing board covers, and Kent Micronite cigarette filters. Over 3,000 Americans are diagnosed with mesothelioma every year, and the exposed often don’t develop symptoms for 20 to 50 years after their first contact with the mineral.
This season preview of Asbestos: A Conspiracy 4,500 Years in the Making maps the investigative journey ahead—from Stone Age Finland (2500 BCE) through the September 11, 2001 attacks, where 400+ tons of asbestos were pulverized into lower Manhattan air.
What we’ll cover this season:
• The exposed products in your home: Asbestos exposure occurred through artificial fireplace embers, Christmas tree decorations, vermiculite garden soil (Libby, Montana), oven mitts, brake pads, and talc-based cosmetics—the FDA found asbestos contamination in Claire’s makeup products as recently as 2019
• The 1935 Sumner Simpson letter: The Raybestos-Manhattan president wrote “the less said about asbestos, the better off we are”—a document that became Exhibit A in thousands of lawsuits against Johns-Manville and the asbestos industry
• The 1943 suppressed mouse study: Dr. LeRoy Gardner at Saranac Laboratory found an 81.8% tumor rate in asbestos-exposed mice—Johns-Manville executives ordered him not to publish, and the research stayed buried until his death in 1946
• The “dropped dead” deposition: In 1984, witness Charles Roemer testified that Johns-Manville executive Lewis Brown said the company would let workers “work until they dropped dead” because “we save a lot of money that way”
• The September 11 mystery: The World Trade Center North Tower (with asbestos fireproofing on floors 1-38) stood for 102 minutes after impact; the South Tower (built after New York City’s 1970 asbestos ban, with no asbestos) collapsed in 56 minutes—and over 44,000 people have since been diagnosed with 9/11-related cancers
• The city called Asbest: A Russian city of 70,000 people sits beside the world’s largest open-pit asbestos mine (7 miles long), with cancer rates 20-40% higher than surrounding regions—and an asbestos museum as a tourist attraction
• The $30+ billion in asbestos trust funds: Exposed workers and families can file for mesothelioma compensation through bankruptcy trusts established by Johns-Manville (1986), W.R. Grace, and dozens of other manufacturers—plus VA disability benefits for the nearly 30% of mesothelioma patients who are military veterans
From Pliny the Elder docu
Asbestos: A Conspiracy 4,500 Years in the Making is sponsored by Danziger & De Llano Mesothelioma Law Firm, a nationwide practice with over 30 years of experience and nearly $2 billion recovered for asbestos victims. If you or someone you love has been diagnosed with mesothelioma, the exposure happened somewhere—and Paul Danziger and Rod De Llano know how to trace it back. For a free consultation, visit https://dandell.com.
Resources:
→ Mesothelioma legal rights: https://dandell.com/mesothelioma/
→ Asbestos exposure sources: https://dandell.com/asbestos-exposure/
→ Asbestos trust funds ($30B+ available): https://dandell.com/asbestos-trust-funds/
→ Free case evaluation: https://dandell.com/contact/
Sister Podcast - MESO: The Mesothelioma Podcast:
http://mesotheliomapodcast.com/
This season on Asbestos, a conspiracy forty five hundred years in the making.
SPEAKER_02:The fake snow in The Wizard of Oz. Asbestos. The glowing embers in your grandparents' fireplace. Asbestos. Toasters, hairdryers, crayons, cigarette filters.
SPEAKER_00:Asbestos. Asbestos.
SPEAKER_02:They put it in everything. And they knew it was killing people. A corporate executive was asked if they'd really let employees work until they drop dead.
SPEAKER_01:His answer? Yes. We save a lot of money that way. That's a real quote.
SPEAKER_02:In a deposition.
SPEAKER_01:That's wild. Medieval monks paying a fortune for what they thought was Jesus' towel? Spoiler, it was asbestos. A Russian city of 70,000 people, literally named Asbestos, where couples get married overlooking a seven-mile open-pit mine.
SPEAKER_02:Cancer rates 40% higher than the surrounding region.
SPEAKER_01:And an asbestos museum as a tourist attraction.
SPEAKER_02:The September 11th mystery we opened with? Why one tower stood for 56 minutes, the other for 102. Plus 6,000 pages of corporate conspiracy found in a box of old letters nobody was supposed to see. From salamander myths to Soviet gulags. From Roman slaves to Russian propaganda. Asbestos, a conspiracy 4,500 years in the making. New episodes weekly. Brought to you by Danziger and Delano, the Mesothelioma law firm. Visit Dandell.com.