Fowler

Petitioner is a farm laborer who on March 29, 1968, was seriously injured in an automobile accident; he seeks review of the opinion and order of the Workmen’s Compensation Appeals Board denying reconsideration of the referee’s findings and award; the referee found that petitioner was injured in the course of his employment with respondent Bell and that his injuries caused permanent partial disability. He also found that part of petitioner’s permanent disability was attributable to a preexisting lower back disease and fixed the disability rating, after apportionment, at 30 percent. It is the finding leading to the apportionment that petitioner challenges in this proceeding; he asserts that the finding is not supported by substantial evidence.

The facts are undisputed. Petitioner injured his back in 1962 and was incapacitated for several Weeks after that injury. He was examined by Dr. J. C. Williams, an orthopedic surgeon, who later, in a letter written to the Farmer’s Insurance Company, indicated that at the time of the 1962 injury petitioner had “a lumbar radicular problem of a mild sort related to the extensive degenerative changes in his lumbar spine.” The doctor said…