Pottsville Asbestos Exposure: Job Sites, Employers & Trades

Quick answer

Exposure around Pottsville clusters in a handful of industries and trades, from the 1930s into the 1980s
You do not need to know a product name — knowing the employer and the years is enough to start
Bystander exposure counts: people who never handled asbestos but worked near those who did
Household members exposed to dust carried home on work clothes may have a claim of their own
Call (570) 526-9592 for a free review — we can usually tell quickly whether a site is one we know

Pottsville made the machinery the coal region ran on. A state historical marker credits Burd Patterson’s furnace on Furnace Island as the first successful smelter of anthracite iron, in 1839 and 1840, and Charles Atkins later ran furnaces there and a rolling mill and steel plant at Fishbach. An 1852 account says the stationary steam engines used across the coal region were built in Pottsville or nearby, and the Philadelphia & Reading Coal & Iron Company directed its collieries from Mahantongo Street. Colliery boiler houses, pumps and hoisting engines were routinely insulated and packed with asbestos-containing materials.

Asbestos exposure is local in a way most injuries are not. It happened at particular buildings, on particular shifts, in particular trades, and the same handful of employers come up again and again in a given town. Around Pottsville the recurring ones include the machine shops and foundries that built steam engines, pumps and hoisting machinery for the Schuylkill collieries, the Philadelphia & Reading Coal & Iron Company, which ran its collieries from offices on Mahantongo Street, the Phillips-Jones shirt factory and power plant on Furnace Island, and the blouse and dress shops that made garments the county’s largest industry, and the Alcoa aluminum extrusion plant at Cressona, built during the Second World War.

The trades most often affected are colliery mechanics and boiler firemen, machinists and foundry molders, powerhouse and plant engineers, factory maintenance men, aluminum-plant production and maintenance crews, railroad men and pipefitters. That reflects where the material actually was: wrapped around steam and process lines, packed into boilers and furnaces, cut into block and cement, sitting in gaskets and packing at every pump and valve, sprayed onto structural steel for fireproofing. The people who installed it, repaired it, and above all tore it out took the heaviest doses, because removal is what puts fiber into the air.

Bystander exposure is the part people discount about themselves. Someone who never touched insulation but worked in the same shop while insulators cut and fitted it all day was breathing the same air. Office and clerical staff in older industrial buildings sometimes have real exposure histories for the same reason. If the honest answer is "I didn't work with it, but I worked around people who did," that is worth a conversation rather than a shrug.

Exposure also travelled home. Dust carried on coveralls into houses across Yorkville, Fishbach, Jalappa, the Island, Lawton’s Hill, Greenwood Hill, Mount Carbon, Port Carbon, Palo Alto, Saint Clair, Minersville, Cressona and Schuylkill Haven exposed spouses and children, most often through laundry. Those household members can have claims in their own right, built on the worker's job history rather than their own.

You are not expected to arrive with product names. Almost nobody remembers whose gaskets were in a pump in 1968. The employer, the job title, and a rough span of years are enough to start; identifying the products is our job, and it is done through supplier records, co-workers, and the histories of the sites themselves. Every case is different, and past results do not guarantee a similar outcome.

The twentieth century added factories. In 1922 Phillips-Jones, the shirt company that grew from a business selling shirts to Pottsville miners in 1881, opened a factory on Furnace Island with its own power plant, and by 1971 the local paper called garment-making the county’s largest industry. Just outside the city, Alcoa built an aluminum extrusion plant at Cressona during the Second World War and ran it until 1977. Sewing and extrusion were not asbestos work in themselves, but the boilers, steam lines and maintenance shops that kept those plants running are where such materials were commonly found.

Call (570) 526-9592

Fees and costs in Pottsville

Consultation and initial case review, at home or at the hospital	$0
Mesothelioma or asbestos claim, handled on contingency	No fee unless there is a recovery — the percentage is agreed in writing before representation begins
Requesting employment, union, and military records on your behalf	Included in the case review

No fee unless there is a recovery. Any fee is a percentage agreed in writing before representation begins.

Questions, answered

Pottsville was the coal company’s town. Wasn’t most of the work in offices?

Some of it was, since the Reading’s coal company ran its collieries from Mahantongo Street. But the city also built and repaired colliery machinery, and its machine shops, foundries and factory boiler rooms are where asbestos-containing insulation and packing were commonly handled.

My father worked at the shirt factory on Furnace Island. Is that a possible exposure?

It can be, depending on the job. The factory had its own power plant, and the men who fired and maintained boilers and steam lines worked around materials that commonly contained asbestos. A maintenance or powerhouse job is a likelier source than a sewing-room one.

Which Pottsville employers come up most in asbestos claims?

The ones that recur locally include the machine shops and foundries that built steam engines, pumps and hoisting machinery for the Schuylkill collieries, the Philadelphia & Reading Coal & Iron Company, which ran its collieries from offices on Mahantongo Street, the Phillips-Jones shirt factory and power plant on Furnace Island, and the blouse and dress shops that made garments the county’s largest industry. That is not an exhaustive list, and a site not named here can still support a claim — the review is where that gets checked.

I never handled asbestos myself, only worked nearby. Does that count?

Often yes. Bystander exposure — working in the same space while others cut, fitted, or removed asbestos — is a recognized exposure route, because the fiber is airborne.

I don't know which products were used. Can I still bring a claim?

Yes. Very few people remember product names decades later. The employer, job title, and approximate years are enough to begin; identifying manufacturers is done through supplier records, site histories, and co-workers.