The Johns-Manville Corp. factory in Waukegan, Illinois was built between 1919 and 1922 and permanently ceased operations in 1998. The 350-acre site was once home to the world’s largest Asbestos manufacturing facility, producing insulation, roofing materials, and other products that contained asbestos from 1928 until 1985.

If you or a loved one worked at the Johns-Manville Waukegan factory or other asbestos jobsites, you may qualify to file a claim or receive a free asbestos health examination courtesy of our law firm. To start your claim today, contact the lawyers at Hissey Mulderig & Friend by calling our office toll-free at 1-855-500-3734, or by filling our our free claims form on the left side of this page.

EPA declares Johns-Manville Waukegan factory Superfund site

In 1982, the Johns-Manville factory in Waukegan was declared one of the first Superfund site. Superfund is a U.S. government program funded by the EPA that is designed to pay for the cleanup of factories and other sites that are contaminated with toxic materials, including asbestos.

Starting in the early 1980s, the EPA worked to study and remove toxic asbestos materials that were present at the Johns-Manville factory in Waukegan. In addition to the removal of asbestos materials from inside the factory’s manufacturing buildings, the EPA also worked to clean-up a 150-acre asbestos waste disposal area on the property where more than 3 million cubic yards of asbestos had been dumped by Johns-Manville. The EPA also identified several nearby sites – including a shooting range, parking lot, nature preserve, and public beach – that had been contaminated with asbestos from the Johns-Manville plant.

After all of the buildings at the site that were used for asbestos manufacturing were demolished between 2000 and 2001, the EPA declared that some areas of the 350-acre site would be made available for development and other public use. 

However, in 2015, EPA officials informed Waukegan residents that even after the 150-acre asbestos dumping ground at the factory was cleaned, the area still contained significant quantities of asbestos materials. As a result of this contamination, the EPA said that the area would not be cleared for public use even after the land was capped and covered with clean soil by the agency.

Asbestos Lawsuits Against Johns-Manville

In the 20th century, Johns-Manville was the largest manufacturer of asbestos products and raw asbestos in the United States. The company manufactured and sold many different products that contained asbestos, including adhesives, brake linings, cement, corrugated paper, gaskets, pipe insulation, roofing materials, sheet packaging, ship and aircraft parts, and textiles.

During the 1920s, workers at Johns-Manville’s many factories across the U.S. began developing illness that were the result of exposure to asbestos.

In 1935, workers at the Johns-Manville’s Waukegan plant filed one of the first asbestos lawsuits in the United States against the company. The lawsuit alleged that the workers had become ill as a result of being exposed to asbestos at the company’s manufacturing plant. However, a judge threw out this lawsuit, stating that the workers had no right to recover damages either through common law or worker’s compensation. This ruling put an end to asbestos litigation against the company until 1957, when another worker filed a lawsuit against Johns-Manville that was eventually settled in 1959.

By the early 1980, more than 9,000 asbestos lawsuits had been filed against Johns-Manville, forcing the company to declare bankruptcy in 1982. Several years later, the company set up two asbestos trust funds to pay for property damages and personal injury claims filed against the company by workers and other individuals who developed mesothelioma cancer, asbestos lung cancer, asbestosis, or other illnesses as a result of exposure to asbestos in the company’s products.

Start Your Claim Today

If you or a loved one worked at the Johns-Manville Corp. factory in Waukegan or other asbestos jobsites in Illinois and have been diagnosed with mesothelioma cancer, asbestos lung cancer, or other diseases caused by exposure to asbestos, you may qualify to file a claim and receive compensation for your illness and medical bills.

If you or your loved one worked at an asbestos jobsite and have developed symptoms which may be a sign of an asbestos-related disease, you may also qualify to receive a free asbestos health examination courtesy of our law firm.

To start your claim today or find out whether you are eligible to receive free asbestos testing, contact the law office of Hissey Mulderig & Friend by calling us toll-free at 1-855-500-3734, or by filling our our free claims form located at the top of this page.