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explosive hazard of dust was not known at first.

These items may not seem like anything now, but they were critical and crisis situations for those of us in the Labor Department because we were to blame, or at least we blamed ourselves. I remember the Solvay Process Company explosion. The New York Times telephoned me when I was out in the country somewhere. I remember that I was Chairman of the Industrial Board by this time. I got up in the middle of the night, got into town and got a train out to Solvay to get there as quickly as possible. I had to find out for myself.

There were two men killed in that explosion, but it would have been more if it had not been during the night after the big day shift was over. They only had a sustaining force and a watchman or two around. Also, a chemical industry comes to the point where it's almost self-operating. It covers miles and miles without a person. There'll be one person somewhere and a mile away there'll be another person who turns a valve.

To this day I don't recall what we finally decided the cause of the explosion at Solvay was, but I remember that we exonerated the firm and ourselves from any carelessness. There had been no violation of law or of regulations and there was no known control that could have been set up at this