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T H E J O C R S d L OF I S D U S T R I A L A N D ESGI>VEERIXG CHEMISTRY
Specific Heat Solubility Specific Gravity Thermal Conductivity Hygroscopicity Tensile Strength Thermal Expansion Refraction Compression Strength Dielectric Constant Dispersion Modulus of Elasticity Electromagnetic Dispersion Hardness Electromagnetic Rotation of Plane of Polarization Absorption (Transmission) of Radiation Both n’ithin and Without the Visible Spectrum X-ray Transmission and Fluorescence
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to this plant. From this modest beginning, the sulfite industry of the United States has developed a t present to a daily production of over 5,000 tons, and the process has revolutionized many departments of paper manufacture. Keedless to say its efficient operation requires constant chemical supervision and control. Another important chemical v~ooclprocess, the soda process, by which the wood is reduced t o pulp by digestion in a strong solution of caustic soda. became possible only after the disThe physical measurements were made in collaboration with coveries and engineering triumphs of a long series of chemists the Physics professors of the Jena University and their students, from Le Blaiic clown through Muspratt, M’eldon and Tennant, I n the glassworks on the chemical side Schott has had the as- had supplied the world with cheap caustic and carbonated alkali. sistance of such men as Herschkowitz, Schaller and Zschimmer, The soda process itsel€ as applied to the manufacture oi wood all of whom have contributed to the literature of glassmaking. pulp is, like the sulfite process, of American origin, having been It is to Zschimmer’s work on “The Glass Industry in Jena” invented by SVatt and Burgess, in 1853, and developed a t nlanathat we are indebted for many of the facts here presented. yunk, near Philadelphia. At first, and for many years, the proOther names to be mentioned in connection with glass de- cess mas operated with no attempt a t recovery of the soda liquors. velopnient are Henriraux a t St. Gobain, famed for plate-glass; The process has been able to hold its own only because or the Bontcrnps. maker o€ optical glass a t Choisey-le-Roi and later development, largely by chemists, oE the processes of soda rea t Birmingham with Chance; the Guinands, the eldest of whom covery. Similarly, in case of the sulfite process, many chemists originated the stirring process for optical glass; Feil, Mantois, ha.ve attacked the far more difficult problem of utilizing the L’zrneuil, Benrath, Powell, Chance, Harris, Siemens; and to the waste sulfite liquors, but thus far only with moderate success. It is, nevertheless, to chemists that we must look for the solutiou list might be added others equally deserving. America’s contributions t o the development of the glass in- of this important problem. The suliate process for chemical wood pulp, an interesting modidustry, chiefly in methods of working and handling the molt,en glass, are epoch-making in character; along more strictly chem- fication of the soda process, was developed by the chemist Dah1 ical lines creditable work has been done, as instanced by the at Danzig about 1883. It has become of great industrial i m Tiffany or Aurene glass, the selenium red, and others. Aside portance during t h e last fern years through its application to the from opiical glass, 0.1 which a beginning is being made, the glasses manufacture of the now well known Kraft wrapping paper, the produced 111 this ccI;ntry probably are fully equal in quality and introduction of which. from Sweden has already exercised a provariety to those produced abroad ; and in some respects America found influence upon the whole wrapping paper industry. is forging ahead. The great names of Le Blanc, Weldon, Solvay and Xond stand for the highest type of the chemical engineer, and to them and CORNJNGr\-snr Y O R X the long line of their associates and successors the paper trade, like many other industries, is indebted lor the cheap alkali and CONTRIBUTIONS OF THE CHEMIST T O THE PULP AND cheap bleaching powder, without which it could hardly exist PAPER INDUSTRY today. It is only necessary to contrast the old methods of treat-. By F. I,. MOORE ing rags by retting and grass bleaching, with the modern methods President American Paper and Pulp Association of pressure cooking and rapid bleaching, to realize how many The manufaLture of pulp and paper is an industry based largely of the foundation stones of paper making have been set in place on chemical reactions and processes and as such has been largely by chemists. dependent upon the efforts of chemists for its maintenance and A further step in advance is the production of electrolytic advancement. Chemists of former days are responsible for inventions to which paper making literally owes its existence bleach and alkali which has become a matter of routine in many in its present lorm, and our modern chemists are essential factors paper mills as the result of the discoveries of Watt in 1851, and the later work of chemists like Le Sueur, Hargraves, Castncr, in the everyday operation o€ this industry. T t is not too much to say that the development of modern paper making and the Tou-nsend and many others. Among the less fundamental, but nevertheless highly imenormous extensions of the use of paper in recent times have been due for the most part to the introduction oE the three chem- portant advances in the art of paper making, which are directly ical processes by which wood fiber has been made arailable as attributable to the chemist, is the introduction of coal tar colors. Practically all of the colors now employed in paper making are a general substitute for rags. The sulfite process, by which wood is reduced t o paper pulp the products of the chemical laboratory, the work of a n army of by digestion in acid bisulfite solutions, was inrented by a Phila- German chemists having supplied us with the whole wonderful delphia chemist, B. C. Tilglinian, iu 1867. Tilghman was range of coal tar colors, many of which are more permanent than also the inventor of the sandblast and ol the important auto- the natural dye-stuffs which they displace. T o chemists also we are indebted for the discovery or the useclave process for the manufacture of glycerin. Although his attempts to manufacture sulfite fiber upon a commercial scale ful properties of rosin in rendering paper resistant to ink and water and for the modern methods of rosin size production, €or failed and 71-ere abandoned because of the many serious tcchnical processes for producing casein for paper coating and for render-. difficulties encountered. his patents tievertheless disclosed a remarkably clear and comprehensive understanding oE the princi- ing it insoluble by the action of formaldehyde, for the discovery ples involved. The process was later taken up in Sweden by of soluble starch so largely used for top sizing, for processes oi Ekman and in Germany by llitscherlich, both of whom were water purification and those for the manufacture of alum, eschemists, and by other iuventors in England and elsewhere, pecially of the high-grade alum, the cheap production of which by whom it was developed along somewhat divergent lines. It has been made possible by the Bayer process for the manufacture returned to the United States in 1883 when the mill of the Rich- of pure alumina. Enough has been said to indicate the vastly important service mond Paper Company was built a t R u d o r d , Iihode Island, which the chemist has rendered in the development o€ the pulp to operate under the Ekman modification of the process, with and paper industry. The chemist of today i s no less vital to a nominal capacity of I O tons per day. -4rthur D. Little, who the industry’s operation and advancement. Under the stress served for many years as official chemist of the American Paper of modern competition, pulp and paper manufacturers are forced and Pulp Association, began his professional work as chemist
Apr., 1915
T H E J O U R N A L OF I N D U S T R I A L A N D ENGINEERING CHEMISTRY
to turn to the chemist with constantly increasing frequency for the testing of supplies, for the control of processes; many of which are essentially chemical in nature, and for the elimination of wastes. The testing of paper, which yearly assumes increasing importance, is entirely in the hands of the chemist, and the chemist is in large part responsible for the startling expansion in the use of paper which has taken place in the last two decades. CONTRIBUTIONS OF THE CHEMIST TO THE INDUSTRIAL DEVELOPMENT OF THE UNITED STATES-A RECORD OF ACHIEVEMENTI By BERNHAKD C HESSE
Since the outbreak of the European War, the American public has been led, adroitly or otherwise, to believe that industrial chemistry, that is, the industrial activity of the chemist, is limited to coal-tar dyes and that nothing should be regarded as industrial chemistry that does not deal with the manufacture of these dyes. Nothing could be further from the truth. While it is true that the manufacture of coal-tar dyes forms an important branch of industrial chemistry, or of chemical industry, whichever you will, it by no means forms the whole of it or even a preponderating part of it. From the economic point of view, economic effect and economic result is the measure to apply in determining economic importance and not the intellectual or scientific labor involved in the creation of that result. From a strictly economic point of view coal-tar dyes can hardly be said to be vital or essential and by that I mean, that we can get along without them and not suffer great hardship, personal or otherwise; anything of less need than that can hardly be called an economic necessity. THE CHEMIST AND HIS WORK
The American public has seemingly given too little consideration to those industries of this country that make use of chemical knowledge and experience in the manufacture or utilization of products and yet these are the ones that compose chemical industry or industrial chemistry. For the present, permit me to give in a few words the substance of the impressive series of papers presented at the meetings of this forenoon and this afternoon, and, as this presentation is being made, please have in mind the question as to whether you would prefer to have the United States able to produce all of its requirements of coal-tar dyes and not able to produce any of the various things which I am about to mention. According to this symposiuni there are a t least nineteen American industries in which the chemist has been of great help, either in founding the industry, in developing it, or in refining the methods of control or of manufacture, thus rendering profit more certain, costs less high and output uniform in standard amount and quality. The substitution of accurate, dependable and non-failing methods of operation for “rule-of-thumb” and “helter-skelter” methods must appeal to every manufacturer as a decided advancement and a valuable contribution NINETEEN AMERICAN CHEMICAL IXDUSTRIES I n presenting to you these various contributions of the chemist, I by no means wish to be understood as in any wise minimizing or reducing the contributions made to the final result by others, such as merchants, bankers, engineers, bacteriologists, electricians, power-men and the like; all that I wish to emphasize is that the chemist did make a contribution, and to that extent he is entitled to credit and acknowledgment. The chemist has made the WINE INDUSTRY reasonably independent of climatic conditions; he has enabled it to produce 1 Public Address a t t h e 50th Meeting of the American Chemical Society, New Orleans, March 31 t o April 3, 1915.
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substantially the same wine, year in and year out, no matter what the weather; he has reduced the spoilage from 2 5 per cent to 0.46 per cent of the total; he has increased the shipping radius of the goods and has made preservatives unnecessary. I n the COPPER IKDUSTRY he has learned and has taught how to make operations so constant and so continuous that in the manufacture of blister copper valuations are less than $1 00 apart on every $10,000 worth of product and in refined copper the valuations of the product do not differ by more than $I 00 in every $50,000 worth of product. The quality of output is maintained constant within microscopic differences. Without the chemist the CORN PRODUCTS INDUSTRY would never have arisen and in 1914 this industry consumed as much corn as was grown in that year by the nine states of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey and Delaware combined; this amount is equal to the entire production of the State of North Carolina and about 80 per cent of the production of each of the States of Georgia, Michigan and Wisconsin; the chemist has produced over roo useful commercial products from corn, which, without him, would never have been produced. I n the ASPHALT INDUSTRY the chemist has taught how to lay a road surface that will always be good, and he has learned and taught how to construct a suitable road surface for different conditions of service. I n the COTTONSEED OIL INDUSTRY, the chemist standardized methods of production, reduced losses, increased yields, made new use of wastes and by-products and has added somewhere between $IO and $ 1 2 to the value of each bale of cotton grown. In the CEMENT INDUSTRY, the chemist has ascertained new ingredients, has utilized theretofore waste products for this purpose, has reduced the waste heaps of many industries and made them his starting material; he has standardized methods of manufacture. introduced methods of chemical control and has insured constancy and permanency of quality and quantity of output. In the SUGAR INDUSTRY, the chemist has been active for so long a time that “the memory of man runneth not to the contrary.” The sugar industry without the chemist is unthinkable. The WELSBACH MANTLE is distinctly a chemist’s invention and its successful and economical manufacture depends largely upon chemical methods. It would be difficult to give a just estimate of the economic effect of this device upon illumination, so great and valuable is it. I n the TEXTILE INDUSTRY, he has substituted uniform, rational, well thought-out and simple methods of treatment of all the various textile fabrics and fibers where mystery, empiricism, “rule-of-thumb” and their accompanying uncertainties reigned. I n the FERTILIZER INDUSTRY, i t was the chemist who learned and who taught how to make our immense beds of phosphate rock useful and serviceable to man in the enrichment of the soil; he has taught how to make waste products of other industries useful and available for fertilization and he has taught how to make the gas works contribute t o the fertility of the soil. I n the SODA INDUSTRY, the chemist can successfully claim that he founded it, developed it, and brought it to its present state of perfection and utility, but not without the help of other technical men; the fundamental ideas were and are chemical. In the LEATHER INDUSTRY, the chemist has given us all of the modern methods of mineral tanning and without them the modern leather industry is unthinkable In the case of vegetable-tanned leather he has also stepped in, standardized the quality of incoming material and of outgoing product. I n the FLOUR INDUSTRY the chemist has learned and taught how t o select the proper grain for specific purposes, to standardize the product and how to make flour available for certain specific culinary and food purposes. In the BREWING INDUSTRY, the chemist has standardized the methods of determining the quality of incoming material and of
