CHAPTER IX. 

 VALUE AND USES OF SHELLS. 



TWENTY-FIVE years ago the shells in the United 

 States did not have a commercial value. Such a 

 thing as a button made from a shell of a fresh- 

 water mussel was unknown. All the pearl buttons that 

 were used here then were imported. About that time a 

 man named J. F. Boepple, who had learned the trade of 

 button making and who was then making buttons at 

 Otensia, near Hamburg, Germany, began to take an in- 

 terest in American fresh-water shells. He received a 

 small box of them and was so successful in his experi- 

 ments with them that he sold his factory there within a 

 short time and came to America to enter the button busi- 

 ness. In 1892 he established a factory in Muscatine, 

 Iowa, and was the first to manufacture buttons from our 

 Unio shells. 



This pioneer in the button business had the advantage 

 of a favorable tariff and an unlimited supply of mussels 

 in the rivers near, yet the first venture was a failure, 

 financially. Mr. Boepple was an expert in his work, yet 

 he seemed to lack some business qualities which are nec- 

 essary to succeed. 



This founder of the button industry was later con 

 nected with the Fairport biological station and in his 



87 



