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.
Episodes
35 episodes
Episode 33: Project 100,000
March 29, 1973. The last American POWs board a transport home. 591,000 servicemembers are discharged that final year. At airports across the country — Travis AFB, San Francisco International, O'Hare — some of them are met with protesters. Sp...
Episode 32 — The Invisible Enemy Within
S1E32 — The Invisible Enemy WithinThe Asbestos Podcast · Season 1 · Arc 7: The Truth Emerges (Episode 3)Episode 32 — The Invisible Enemy Within1939. A Navy Medical Officer recommends respirators for pipe coverin...
Episode 31 — The Conference That Changed Everything
Episode 31 — The Conference That Changed EverythingOctober 19th, 1964. Four hundred scientists in the room at the New York Academy of Sciences. The data is in front of them: 339 of 392 insulation workers with twenty or more...
Episode 30: Selikoff’s Warning
S1E30 — Selikoff’s WarningThe Asbestos Podcast · Season 1 · Arc 7: The Truth Emerges (Episode 1)Episode 30 — Selikoff’s WarningOctober 19th, 1964. New York Academy of Sciences. Over 400 scientists in the room. Dr. ...
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Episode 29: The Shipyard Generation
S1E29 — The Shipyard GenerationThe Asbestos Podcast · Season 1 · Arc 6: The War Effort (Finale)Episode 29 — The Shipyard GenerationVeterans are 6 to 7 percent of the U.S. population. They account for 30 percent<...
Episode 28 — Wartime Production, Peacetime Deaths
Episode 28 — Wartime Production, Peacetime DeathsWhen World War II ended, asbestos production should have declined. Instead, U.S. consumption increased 107% — from 343,000 tons in 1945 to 709,000 tons by 1955. The post-war ...
Episode 27: The Women Of The Shipyards
Episode 27 — The Women of the ShipyardsBy May 1943, 45,174 women worked in U.S. Navy yards alone. They held welding torches. They cut asbestos cloth with their hands. They sewed insulation blankets. They filled sewn forms w...
Episode 26 — The Shipyards Never Sleep
S1E26 — The Shipyards Never SleepThe Asbestos Podcast · Season 1 · Arc 6: The War Effort, 1942–1945 (consequences to present)Episode 26 — The Shipyards Never Sleep“The first time I walked out on the ways, I was wal...
Episode 25: The Navy Comes Calling
Episode 25: The Navy Comes CallingAt the 1939 World's Fair, Johns-Manville's Asbestos Man posed for photographs while the company's chief counsel managed the Saranac coverup. Two months later, Congress passed the Strategic Materia...
Special Episode: The Magic Mineral At War
Asbestos genuinely helped the Allies win World War II. The U.S. government classified it as a strategic material in 1939. Over 300 asbestos-containing products were mandated for every Navy vessel. 1.7 million workers entered the shipyards. The ...
Episode 24: The Paper Trail
In a locked safe at Raybestos-Manhattan Corporation headquarters in Stratford, Connecticut, approximately 6,000 documents sat undisturbed for forty-four years. They were filed alphabetically under a single label: DUST
Episode 23 — The Human Experiments
Episode 23 — The Human ExperimentsGardner’s 81.8% wasn’t an anomaly. It was one data point in a thirty-year pattern. By 1960, at least six independent lines of animal evidence had documented that asbestos causes cancer — st...
Episode 22: The Saranac Coverup
Episode 22: The Saranac CoverupIn 1936, nine asbestos companies funded research at Saranac Laboratory with a contract clause making all results their "property" — publication only "if deemed desirable." When Dr. LeRoy Upson Gardne...
Episode 21: The Asbestos Textile Institute
On March 7, 1957, the Asbestos Textile Institute's Air Hygiene subcommittee voted NOT to fund cancer research. Their minutes recorded three reasons: someone else was studying it, it would "stir up a hornet's nest," and they didn't believ...
Episode 20: The Less Said About Asbestos, the Better
"I think the less said about asbestos, the better off we are." On October 1, 1935, Sumner Simpson—president of Raybestos-Manhattan—wrote those thirteen words to the general counsel of Johns-Manville. This letter, hidden in a vault for 42...
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Episode 19: Two Prosecutions
Everyone says there were two prosecutions under Britain's 1931 Asbestos Industry Regulations in thirty-seven years of enforcement. Everyone is wrong. The real number is three to four distinct prosecution events — and the way the myth for...
Episode 18: The Merewether Report
In 1928, Dr. Edward Merewether examined 363 asbestos workers across six British mills—Turner Brothers Rochdale, Trafford Park, Washington, Leeds, Barking, and Clydebank. His findings were devastating: 80.9% of workers with 20+ years exposure ha...
Episode 17: Asbestosis Gets a Name
Episode 17: Asbestosis Gets a NameIn 1924, Nellie Kershaw was buried in an unmarked grave in Rochdale Cemetery. Turner Brothers refused to pay her husband seven pounds for the funeral — their reasoning, in writing: “it would create a p...
Episode 16: The Doctors Who Knew
Episode 16: The Doctors Who KnewIn 1910, Professor J.M. Beattie proved asbestos causes lung fibrosis in animals—published in a government report to Parliament. The response: better ventilation. By 1924, Dr. William Edmund Cooke ex...
Episode 15: The Body Count Begins
Episode 15: The Body Count BeginsIt's 1890 in Normandy, France. Paul Fleury recruits 17 cotton workers to process asbestos. Sixteen die—a 94% mortality rate that inspectors won't document for 16 years. Meanwhile, Lucy Deane, one o...
Episode 14: The Workers Nobody Counted
Episode 14: The Workers Nobody CountedBetween 1880 and 1920, asbestos companies tracked production to the tenth of a pound but recorded zero occupational disease deaths. They documented every fatal accident with names and ages—but...
Episode 13: The Magic Mineral Goes Mainstream
Episode 13: The Magic Mineral Goes MainstreamHow did asbestos go from industrial hazard to kitchen staple? By 1958, the U.S. Geological Survey counted over 3,000 applications—from ceiling tiles to cigarette filters delivering 131 ...
Episode 12: Raybestos and the Brake Pad Revolution
Episode 12: Raybestos and the Brake Pad RevolutionDid the auto industry know brake dust was killing mechanics? By 1935, yes—and they agreed to stay quiet. On October 1, 1935, Raybestos president Sumner Simpson wrote to Johns-Manvi...
