Learning from history

Abstract

The ways historians assemble primary material from which to learn how industry has failed to protect workers and the environment is changing dramatically. Increasingly, historians focus concern on the evolution of the internet and the demise of paper records. The authors of "Monsanto, PCBs," and the Creation of a "World-Wide Ecological Problem" (2018) are also founders of ToxicDocs.org. This web-based resource provides an entirely new degree of transparency. Readers of their article may look at any document they cite by clicking on the reference. Those with or without expertise in science can now judge these authors' analysis, and much more: entertain new lines of inquiry, ask new questions, obtain new insights, and publish well-documented pieces that offer new knowledge and insight to enrich our understanding, not only of the PCB story, but also industry's general behavior when using or marketing toxic substances.

Keywords: History; Legal discovery; Primary documents; Public health; Searchable; ToxicDocs.org.