Yet even now, many Libby residents say Grace is getting a bad rap. They say the company inherited some of the asbestos problems -- and liability for employees like Skramstad -- from the Zonolite Co., which sold Grace the mine, a mill and other assets for about $9 million in 1963.
By April 2001, Grace had received 206 asbestos-related personal injury claims from Libby, said William M. Corcoran, vice president of public and regulatory affairs at Grace.
Mayor Tony Berget said he is eager for his town to get a clean bill of health.
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Timeline
• 1939 Zonolite Co. formed to mine and process vermiculite at Libby mine.
• 1963 W.R. Grace & Co. purchases the mine and other assets from Zonolite for about $9 million.
• 1974 Grace receives first asbestos-related workers' compensation claim in Libby.
• 1977 A Grace-commissioned study of hamsters finds a link between asbestos fibers and cancer. Separately, the first asbestos-related personal injury lawsuits from Libby are filed against Grace.
• 1990 Grace stops mining vermiculite at Libby (processing continues until 1992).
• 1999 EPA arrives in Libby to investigate news report about asbestos-related health crisis and later declares area a Superfund site. EPA has spent $86 million on cleanup. Grace moves headquarters to Columbia from Boca Raton, Fla.
• 2000 Grace initiates medical coverage for Libby residents diagnosed with asbestos-related diseases.
• 2001 Grace and 61 domestic subsidiaries file for bankruptcy protection, citing 81 percent spike in asbestos claims from 1999 to 2000. Grace says only 206 of the 325,000 injury claims were from Libby.
• 2005 Federal prosecutors charge Grace with knowingly exposing mine workers and residents in Libby to asbestos and covering up the danger. Seven current and former employees also face charges.
SOURCES: Company and U.S. Attorney for the District of Montana
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Of those claims, 120 were from people exposed to asbestos prior to 1963. An additional 79 were from workers employed between 1963 and 1974. After 1974, when Grace started spraying a fine mist at the enclosed mill to keep vermiculite dust from getting airborne, the number of claims dropped to seven.
"So we were doing something right," Corcoran said.
Grace also spread its wealth across this town for decades, donating baseball uniforms and providing hundreds of steady jobs in this remote region.
"There's lots of people that aren't real harsh on Grace, because they were the Cadillac of jobs at the time in this town," said two-term mayor Tony Berget, over a cheeseburger lunch at Antler's Restaurant.
Berget said many residents have lashed out at the most assertive victims. He said that he hears some residents say, "Some of the more vocal ones, they had a cigarette in their mouth and one lit in their hands."
Smokers who worked with asbestos have a 50 to 90 percent greater risk of contracting lung cancer than other people, according to the American Cancer Society. That's why Grace in 1977 stopped hiring people who smoked and in 1978 banned smoking on company premises, company officials said.
Even before then, Grace said it made safety improvements, such as requiring respirators, improving ventilation and X-raying employees.
Noble said that when he started work at the Grace mine in 1970, just out of high school, it was difficult to see even a 300-watt light bulb because of the dust swirling in the air. Things got better over the years, Noble said, as Grace took measures to reduce the dust. Grace stopped mining in 1990 but continued operations at the site until 1992.
