June i, 1901.] 



THE INDIA RUBBER WORLD 



263 



THE ORIGIN OF THE HARD RUBBER INDUSTRY. 



By Dr. Heinrich Trautt (Hamburg).* 



WHEN Charles Goodyear put his first samples of elas- 

 tic hard rubber before the public in New York, dur- 

 ing 1S51, they aroused in the first place the interest 

 of the then highly flourishing whalebone industry, on 

 account of their qualities similar to those of whalebone. Among 

 the most efficient whalebone manufacturers of that time was 

 the world-wide known firm of H. C. Meyer, Jr., in Hamburg, 

 founded in 1818. This firm in 1842 established under the name 

 of H. A. Meyer (name of the eldest son of H. C. Meyer, Jr.), a 

 whalebone factory in Jersey City, opposite New York, which 

 in 1848 was transferred to Williamsburgh, Long Island. Early 

 in 1852 the latter successfully negotiated— by means of Mr. 

 Conrad Poppenhusen, who had entered the firm in 1843 — with 

 Charles Goodyear for a license for making hard rubber by his 

 firm of Meyer & Poppenhusen. 



As early as December 31, 1849, Charles Goodyear, through 

 his brother. Nelson Goodyear, secured from the patent office 

 at Washington, a caveat for hard rubber; on December 20, 



1850, he filed his application for publishing, and on May 6, 



1851, obtained the much contested, entirely insufficient first 

 patent on hard rubber. With astonishing energy, and at con- 

 siderable expense, Charles Goodyear manufactured almost all 

 of the objects of daily use — no matter whether they could be 

 made out of hard rubber to advantage or not — out of his ma- 

 terial, viz.: the hard vulcanized India-rubber, believing his 

 rights for the sole manufacturing to be completely covered by 

 patents. 



In spite of using his own fortune and that of his friends for 

 advertising (the Great Exhibition in London of 1851 cost him 

 about $30,000, and that of Paris, in 1855, $50,000) he did not 

 succeed in arousing afar-reaching interest for his hard rubber. 

 Only the above mentioned firm of Meyer & Poppenhusen ac- 

 quired from him on March 22, 1852, a license for the manufac- 

 ture of artificial whalebone, and on January 12, 1853, that of 

 hard rubber combs. Not included at the beginning was the 

 license for fabrication of dandruff or narrow combs ; for the 

 latter, however, a license was obtained on September 13, 1853. 

 For the making of hard rubber whip handles Meyer & Poppen- 

 husen obtained a license on January 26, 1854. 



Meyer & Poppenhusen noticed at once that the process 

 patented by Goodyear could not be exploited to advantage on a 

 larger scale, either technically or financially. The molded ob- 

 jects were covered with talcum, vulcanized with steam apparatus 

 in sand or plaster molds, and consequently presented a surface 

 which was rough, brown or yellow, and impregnated with sand 

 and other foreign substances, besides being uneven in hardness 

 and firmness. 



It was reserved to the brother of H. C. Meyer, Jr., from 

 Hamburg, L. Otto P. Meyer, engineer and technical director of 

 the plant of Meyer & Poppenhusen, in New York, to make the 

 invention of Goodyear useful and generally applicable for rub- 

 ber whalebone and rubber combs, by introducing the so-called 

 " water hardening " and the use of tin foil and tin forms. His 

 inventions were patented in Washington on December 20, 



1853, and extended December 20, 1867 ; patented February 28, 



1854, and extended February 28, 1868; patented April 4, 1854, 

 reissued August 16, 1859, and extended April 4. 1868. They 



formed for twenty-one years the only eflfective protection for 

 the maintenance of the hard rubber monopoly in the United 

 States, Goodyear's patents being untenable. Those who are 

 more interested in the contests over the different hard rubber 

 patents, are referred to the patent proceedings in the United 

 States circuit court: Conrad Poppenhusen (representative of 

 L. Otto P. Meyer) vs. New York Gutta-Percha Comb Co., 

 1858; Same T'j. John Dixon, i860; Same z*.?. Oscar Falke, Ed- 

 ward Simon, Frederick Simon, Charles Jenkins, Darius Banks, 

 and Eberhard Faber, 1861 and 1862.* 



By L. Otto P. Meyer's tinfoil patent — in other words, by the 

 application of this metal, almost indifTerent against sulphur, as 

 a protection of the surfaces during vulcanization — a possibil- 

 ity was created, to mold hard rubber objects before vulcaniza- 

 tion, to preserve the sharp contour lines unchanged during 

 the heat of vulcanization, and to take the hard rubber in its 

 characteristic deep-black color with metallic, glossy surfaces 

 directly from the vulcanization apparatus. The covering of 

 the objects to be vulcanized with tinfoil (or other adequate 

 metal foil) or tin-moIdings, rendered it possible at the same 

 time to put them in water ora similar liquid, being a good heat- 

 conductor, so as to obtain an even temperature during vulcan- 

 ization and a uniform hardening of all objects in all of their 

 parts. 



Also in all other directions L. Otto P. Meyer and his firm of 

 Meyer & Poppenhusen worked restlessly on the improving of 

 the hard rubber industry. Continuously they experimented 

 with new grades of rubber, different kinds of which appeared 

 periodically on the market, and finally made the using of even 

 the poorest rubber grades possible for their purposes by elimi- 

 nating the resin, and by careful and peculiar cleaning. The 

 origin of almost all the important auxiliary machinery of the 

 hard rubber industry may be dated back to this period. 



In such way the firm of Meyer & Poppenhusen in New York 

 came in a position to put on the market as early as the close 

 of 1852 the first really useful hard rubber whalebone and the 

 first hard rubber combs, and in 1853 they provided the market 

 with these fabrics on an extensive scale. The perspicacity of 

 the owners of the firm of Meyer & Poppenhusen, as well as 

 their long standing experience in the whalebone trade, very 

 soon established the fact that the firmness and elasticity of 

 hard rubber, especially under great changes of temperature 

 were not adequate to cope with the genuine whalebone in a 

 successful manner ; but that the chemical and physical qualities 

 of hard rubber made it an excellent material for the ma.iufac- 

 turing of dressing combs, dandruflf combs, children's ccTibs, and 

 other similar articles. 



This knowledge led in 1853 to the formation of the far 

 famed India Rubber Comb Co. in New York, the leading hard 

 rubber comb factory in the world. They put out their produc- 

 tions first on the premises of Meyer & Poppenhusen. In 1854 

 this comb industry was transferred into the large factory at 

 College Point, Long Island, which still exists, while up to the 



* From the Gurrtmi-^gitung;. XV JahrR., Nr. is, pp. I96-197. 



*The India Rubdfir World library contains a volume comprising the printed 

 record of another case—" II. H. Goodyear (administrator 0/ Nelson Goodyear) and 

 Conrad Poppenlmsen vs. The New York Gutta Percha and India Rubber Vulcan- 

 ite Co, rt al," decided in the United States circuit court in 1862, which appears to 

 have been the final case in the long continued litigation over the hard rubber pat 

 ents, establishing the validity of the issue to Nelson Goodyear. — Tua Ecnon. 



