The Progression of Industrial Hygiene

Abstract Industrial hygiene in the United States began with the work of Alice Hamilton during the first and second decades of the 20th century. After educational efforts initiated at Harvard University in the late 1920s, there was growth stemming from the Social Security Act in the 1930s, with selected states providing services. The American Conference of Governmental Industrial Hygienists was formed in 1938 and the American Industrial Hygiene Association in 1939. The Second World War and the immediate postwar period provided some growth of industrial hygiene in the private sector. Increased federal legislation addressing the environment called for research, training, and, ultimately, regulation in the 1960s; this set the stage for the landmark Occupational Safety and Health Act (OSHAct) of 1970. In this article, pre-OSHAct and post-OSHAct industrial hygiene regulation and practice are characterized by six distinct periods of time. Each period is described and characteristics of, or implications for, prof...