The Ramazzini Institute
for Occupational and Environmental Health Research   

Who Are We?

William Jamieson Nicholson
Pioneer of Science, Sensitive Human, Touchstone for Integrity

     April 9^th, while jogging near his home in fair lawn, New jersey, William J. Nicholson, PhD, suffered heart failure. A life-long athlete, he was 70 years old. An officer and a founding member of the Board of The Ramazzini Institute, Dr. Nicholson was Professor Emeritus in Community and Preventive Medicine at Mt. Sinai School of Medicine, New York.
     Nicholson pioneered, with his close friend and mentor the late Irving J. Selikoff, the integration of the basic biological, physical and mathematical disciplines required to clearly define the causes and course of environmental disease. While he is best known for his work in establishing with Dr. Selikoff the full impact and need for control of asbestos-related disease, he also was a leader in the description and control of vinyl chloride, ionizing radiation, pesticides and other toxic agents.
     His work relating disparate data, much of which he generated himself, from air monitoring, epidemiology, toxicology, clinical medicine, and control technology was recognized for its extraordinary high level of technical and analytical competence in the United States and worldwide. Coupled with his reputation for unshakeable personal honesty and sensitivity, he became a much sought-after witness in the courts and before legislative and regulatory bodies. Often shy and always self-effacing, the impact and breadth of his work is largely unrecognized. He was the author of the petition for the first permanent standard set under the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970, for asbestos, submitted by the Industrial Union Department of the AFL-CIO.
     With Dr. Henry Anderson, now a Wisconsin State Health Department Deputy Commissioner and then serving part of his residency in Occupational and Environmental Medicine at Mt. Sinai on assignment to the Industrial Union Department, Nicholson successfully linked existing control and health effects data in part gathered by the Mt. Sinai team. Trusting his judgment, the unions led by Peter Bommarito, a Vice President of the Industrial Union Department and President of the rubber and plastics workers union, pressed for technically feasible, stringently lower levels of vinyl chloride gas in the work and community environments. This position prevailed in the OSHA and EPA rulemaking process, withstood multiple court challenges, and actually aided profitable growth in North America and Europe for the plastics industry.
     Nicholson was a trusted arbiter on the ethical interpretation of controversial research data. It was this innate moral sense that brought him in partnership with Selikoff. In the late ‘60s, he was a candidate in the primary for the congressional seat centered in Ridgewood , NJ, where Selikoff lived. Selikoff’s late wife Celia ran an afternoon fundraiser for him in the Selikoff home. In the course of being introduced, some disparaging personal remarks were made about his opponents. Nicholson’s sense of fairness led him not only to talk about the social issues with which he was deeply concerned, but also to defend his opponents. He lost the primary, but helped to change the political climate in the district. In the next election, his friend Andrew McGuire won the primary and went on to win the seat. The night of the fundraiser, after Mrs Selikoff told Dr. Selikoff what had occurred, Selikoff telephoned Nicholson and convinced him to leave a post at Columbia University for a position in Selikoff’s laboratory.
     Faced with a rising tide of questionable research used to perpetuate the hazards of asbestos, he worked with Selikoff to provide positive incentives for better research through joint efforts of unions, corporations and environmental health scientists in government and academia. He and Selikoff were the hosts at the luncheon in the Cosmos Club in Washington at which The Ramazzini Institute was born.
     Nicholson was quintessentially sensitive to the needs of others. This writer remembers him working nearly around the clock in a screening of asbestos miners in Copperopolis, California. More workers had appeared for examination than expected, mostly in the evening. Mrs. Selikoff , as “Director of Queueing,“ had been on her feet almost unrelieved for 14 hours. Her feet and ankles were badly swollen. She took her shoes off and kept working. Seeing this, Bill, who did most of the work history interviews, quietly took his own shoes off.
     “Are your feet swollen,” I asked? “No,” said Bill, “ I just don’t want Celia to feel alone!”
     When you were with Bill, you were never alone.

Institute Officers and Directors