INTRODUCTION xi 



under the energetic and effective leadership of W. R. Whitney. 

 If the scores of devices and improvements that have flowed 

 from this laboratory were restricted merely to the Mazda 

 lamp, this country would have gained greatly by its establish- 

 ment. In another field George Eastman, recognizing that 

 photographic materials and methods are susceptible to great 

 improvement, founded in '1912 the Research Laboratory of the 

 Eastman Kodak Company, where C. E. K. Mees and his as- 

 sociates are accomplishing many important advances. One 

 might go on to mention many other successful laboratories of 

 industrial research in this country, including those of Thomas 

 A. Edison, the Westinghouse Electric and Manufacturing 

 Company, the Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company, the United 

 States Steel Corporation, the General Chemical Company, the 

 General Bakelite Company, and others of equal importance. 

 A notable case is the research laboratory of the du Pont de 

 Nemours Company, which began with six chemists in 1902, 

 and employed three hundred chemists in 1918, when its an- 

 nual expenditure had reached three million dollars. 



While the prime objects of these laboratories is the direct 

 solution of problems arising in the industries, much research 

 for the advancement of science is done in them, and their di- 

 recting heads are constantly emphasizing the importance of 

 fundamental science and its development. Thus W. R. Whit- 

 ney has said : 



" Necessity is not the mother of invention ; knowledge and ex- 

 periment are its parents. This is clearly seen in the case of many 

 industrial discoveries ; high-speed cutting tools were not a necessity 

 which preceded, but an application which followed the discovery 

 of the properties of tungsten-chromium-iron alloys; so, too, the 

 use of titanium in arc lamps and of vanadium in steel were sequels 

 to the industrial preparation of these metals, and not discoveries 

 made by sheer force of necessity." 



One of the best illustrations of the practical importance of 

 researches made solely for the purpose of increasing knowledge 



