The development of plastics is believed to have started around 1860, when Phelan and Collander, a U.S. pool and billiard ball company, offered a prize of $10,000 to the person who could design the best substitute for natural ivory. One of the entrants, although not the winner, was John Wesley Hyatt who developed a cellulose derivative for the contest. His product was later patented under the name Celluloid and was quite successful commercially, being used in the manufacture of products ranging from dental plates to men’s collars.
Over the next few decades, more and more plastics were introduced, including some modified natural polymers like rayon, made from cellulose products. Shortly after the turn of the century, Leo Hendrik Baekeland, a Belgian-American chemist, developed the first completely synthetic plastic which he sold under the name Bakelite.
Nylon was first prepared by Wallace H. Carothers of DuPont, but was set aside as having no useful characteristics, because in its initial form, nylon was a sticky material with little structural integrity. One day, Julian Hill, a chemist at DuPont, put a small amount of this nylon material on the end of a stirring rod and pulled it away from the remaining sticky mass, forming a string. Hill observed that the thread was quite strong and had a silky appearance and then realized that nylon, when drawn out, could be useful as a fiber.
Source : dwb4.unl.edu/Chem/CHEM869E/CHEM869ELinks/qlink.queensu.ca/~6jrt/chem210/Page2.html
Over the next few decades, more and more plastics were introduced, including some modified natural polymers like rayon, made from cellulose products. Shortly after the turn of the century, Leo Hendrik Baekeland, a Belgian-American chemist, developed the first completely synthetic plastic which he sold under the name Bakelite.
Nylon was first prepared by Wallace H. Carothers of DuPont, but was set aside as having no useful characteristics, because in its initial form, nylon was a sticky material with little structural integrity. One day, Julian Hill, a chemist at DuPont, put a small amount of this nylon material on the end of a stirring rod and pulled it away from the remaining sticky mass, forming a string. Hill observed that the thread was quite strong and had a silky appearance and then realized that nylon, when drawn out, could be useful as a fiber.
Source : dwb4.unl.edu/Chem/CHEM869E/CHEM869ELinks/qlink.queensu.ca/~6jrt/chem210/Page2.html
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