264 



THE INDIA RUBBER WORLD 



[June 



1901. 



end of 1855 the vulcanized plates for the combs and for the 

 artificial whalebone were made and furnished by L. Otto P. 

 Meyer.in Newton, Connecticut. 



Owing to the death of his father, Henry Ad. Meyer was 

 obliged to return to Hamburg so as to assume the manage- 

 ment of the factories over there, and Mr. Poppenhusen took 

 part in the formation of the India Rubber Comb Co. in New 

 York, while at the same time the firm of H. C. Meyer, Jr., in- 

 augurated the fabrication of hard rubbei whalebone in Ham- 

 burg, bringing into life in Harburg m 1856 the first German 

 hard rubber comb man- 

 ufactory, under the name 

 of the Harburger Gum- 

 mi -Kamm Compagnie 

 (Harburg Rubber Comb 

 Co.).* 



As commercial man- 

 ager, and after many 

 changes in \M.t personnel, 

 H. W. Maurien joined 

 the Harburg Rubber 

 Comb Co., and as tech- 

 nical director, Mr. 

 Buecking. The fabrica- 

 tion of hard rubber 

 whalebone and of the 

 various hard rubber ar- 

 ticles (we only mention 

 chirurgical and electric- 

 al apparatus and arti- 

 cles, knife-handles, 

 drawing and smoking 

 utensils, etc.) was car- 

 ried on in Hamburg by 

 the firm of H. C. Meyer, 

 Jr., and in course of time 

 brought to great perfection. 



At the beginning of the fifties Charles Goodyear, as far as 

 can be ascertained, sold his English patent to the Scotch Vul- 

 canite Co. in Edinburgh. The French hard rubber patent of 

 Goodyear was fought and, after a prolonged lawsuit, cancelled, 

 because somebody before Goodyear had produced a mass simi- 

 lar to hard rubber by dipping rubber into molten sulphur, and 

 had patented the same. Then Goodyear himself visited Paris 

 in 1852, assisting in the erection of several soft rubber factories 

 there, introducing with them also the process of hard rubber 

 making. Goodyear himself did not know at that time the in- 

 vention of L. Otto P. Meyer, and hence the hard rubber indus- 

 try began to develop in France many years later, after Germany 

 had brought this fabrication to a state of prosperity. Similar 

 was the case with the introduction of the industry in other 

 European countries. 



May it be given to Germany to remain in this respect the 

 leading nation ! To reach this end it will, however, be neces- 

 sary, in the first place, that our manufacturers persist more 

 than heretofore in their endeavor to work in the direction of 

 quality and not to juggle with the prices among themselves 

 and with foreign countries. 



[Note — It may be of interest to read, in connection with tlie preceding article, 

 a paper published in The India Rubbkr World April i, iStj8, on tlie " Develop- 

 ment of tlic Hard Rubber Industry."— The Editor.] 



THE NEW MEXICAN RUBBER. 



\>^" 



HARD RUBBER FACTORY OF 



[Located at Newtown, Connecticut. Occupied 

 Belting and Packing Co. and remodelled as their ' 



REPRODUCED FROM THE 



•This has grown into the important concern of which Dr. Heinrich Traun, a 

 descendant of the Meyer family through his mother, and the writer of this article, 

 is now the proprietor, and which has been described at length in the pages of 

 Thb India Rubbbr World. — Thb Editor. 



IN a recent oflScial report the United States consul at Mata- 

 moras, Mexico — P. Merrill Griffith — gives some interesting 

 details regarding the new factory at San Luis Potosi, already 

 mentioned in The India Ruisber World as having been es- 

 tablished for the extraction of rubber from a plant growing in 

 the mountainous districts of Mexico. This plant has not yet 

 been identified botanically by any of The India Rubber 

 World's correspondents, but Consul Merrill makes an interest- 

 ing statement to the 

 effect that it is found 

 also " in certain locali- 

 ties of Texas, Wyoming, 

 and Nebraska." The 

 plant is known locally 

 as "hule," but this is 

 the name applied to the 

 rubber tree generally in 

 Mexico. In the patent 

 issued to William Pram- 

 polini, however, cover- 

 ing the process for the 

 extraction of the gum, 

 the shrub is described 

 as the Synaniheroeas 

 Mexicanas. 



"The principal steps 

 in the process of manu- 

 facture," writes Consul 

 Merrill, " are as follows : 

 There are special ma- 

 chines which feed the 

 plant automatically in- 

 to the cutters ; after it 

 comes out of these ma- 

 chines, it is carried by a bucket elevator and dumped into 

 steam-jacketed mixing tanks, containing certain chemicals; the 

 product then runs by gravity into hydraulic filter presses, after 

 which it is subjected to a hydrostatic pressure of 75 pounds 

 to the square inch ; it is then conveyed into settling tanks, 

 where the gum, being heavier, settles to the bottom, while the 

 chemicals and residue are drawn off." The special machinery 

 used was designed and has been patented bytheCia.de Fundi- 

 cion de Fierro y Manufacturera de Monterey (Monterey Foun- 

 dry and Manufacturing Co.). 



A letter to The India Rubber World from Monterey 

 says: "The 'hule' is a small, rugged, hardy, bushlike plant 

 which grows to a height of three or four feet. The leaves on 

 the plant very much resemble those of the sage brush. In some 

 parts of Mexico the plant is ground on ' metates 'or stones, 

 with water running over it, and the gum or rubber is held to- 

 gether in a mass, while the addition of a little water removes 

 the woody substance. This process, of course, is far from be- 

 ing a commercial success, for the reason that the product is 

 not entirely cleaned, and for the further reason that only very 

 small quantities can be produced in this way. The rubber 

 thus obtained is very springy and elastic, and is usually rolled 

 into balls, as playthings for children." 



The plant above described no doubt is the same which Mr. 

 John H. Cheever, of the New York Belting and Packing Co., 

 experimented with, some twelve years ago. Mr. Cheever con- 

 sidered the rubber obtained from the plant to be equal to the 

 best Centrals, but his experiments soon ceased on account of 

 the expense of bringing the bark to his factories. 



MEYER & POPPENHUSEN. 



1853-55- In ^^^i purchased by the New York 

 ' Factory No. 2." Destroyed by fire in 18S7.] 



" GUMMI-ZEITUNG." 



