India Rubber

1895

A Comparatively Recent but Potent Factor In Science and Progress.

In our own day it really seems as if we couldn't possibly get on without India rubber and gutta percha. Though both are of comparatively recent introduction, the number of purposes to which they are applied is so immense that our civilization without them would at least be very different from the form in which we actually know it.

To lump a few miscellaneous examples in a single paragraph: Without those two submarine cables would be almost impossible; telegraphy would assume many unlike modifications; goloshes would not exist; waterproofs and mackintoshes would be a beautiful dream and a rubberless world a hideous reality; elastic, in the sense in which ladies use the word, for tying hats or making garters would never have been evolved; tobacco pouches would still be of silk or leather; our combs would be of horn, and our buttons, paper knives, penholders and pipes much dearer than at present.

As for machinery, where would it be without India rubber cinctures and tubes and cups and valves and buffers? Where would engineering be without the endless minute applications of the elastic gum? Where would surgery be without the innumerable devices, the syringes and squirts, the belts and bandages of which India rubber forms the sole, and, as it seems to us now, indispensable basis? Fancy putting out fires without the invaluable hose; fancy whirring manufactories without the inevitable gearing. The bicyclist would miss his pneumatic tires; the artist would miss his ever handy eraser.

When we go to the dentist, which is always in itself a delightful excursion, a happy hour is made happier for us by the India rubber sheet with which he dexterously contrives to check undue loquacity. When we go to the gymnasium, half the apparatus we employ is based on it. And what would life be at the present day without India rubber hot water bottles? — Longman's Magazine.

Real Gratitude — Guilty Man Happy With Not-Guilty Verdict

1914

When Blaine was a young lawyer and cases were few, he was asked to defend a poverty-stricken tramp accused of stealing a watch. He pleaded with all the ardor at his command, drawing so pathetic a picture with such convincing energy that at the close of his argument the court was in tears and even the tramp wept. The jury deliberated a few minutes and returned the verdict "not guilty." Then the tramp drew himself up, tears streaming down his face as he looked at the future "plumed knight" and said: "Sir, I have never heard so grand a plea. I have not cried before since I was a child. I have no money with which to reward you, but (drawing a package from the depths of his ragged clothes), here's the watch; take it and welcome." — Pittsburgh Chronicle Telegraph.


New Idea for Belting

Those who buy belting for machinery will not have to worry about the price of leather in the years to come if a certain sort of belting which is being manufactured by a firm in Connecticut proves to be a success. The new product is called flexible steel belting and is really a step further than the chain and sprocket idea. The belting is made in a complicated series of links and can be used on all pulleys of from two inches in diameter to the largest size. It has been designed especially for service where atmospheric conditions are bad for leather and rubber belts.

The First Rubber Boots: Standing in Water Like a Heron

1916

RUBBER AND HUMOR.

A Closely Clinging Garment and a Laughable Request.

Once Professor Emmet of the University of Virginia visited in New York with his family and while there received from abroad a pair of india rubber cloth boots. His son, Dr. Thomas Addis Emmet, in his book, "Incidents of My Life," says that his distinguished father was happier in his new possessions than a child with a new toy and spent most of his time standing like a heron in the water to test them.

Their shape was not such as would have fascinated Packelan, the famous bootmaker. They were made like a long stocking of coarse canvas, with a leather sole, and over all was smeared a paste of rubber which might have answered in cold weather, but which was sticky and ill smelling under a moderately hot sun. In very few articles has there been more improvement than in rubber goods since they first came into use.

My father took back with him a "raincoat" as a present to our old negro coachman, but he could never be induced to wear it in the rain, and when expostulated with his answer was, "Does you t'ink I's gwine wear dis new coat in de rain?" He never wore it except in the bright sunshine and on a warm day, so that when he got off the box at the stable it was necessary to take with him the cushion and remove his trousers before he could get his coat off.

I recollect as a child the first "gum shoes" in use, which were hideous to look at and most uncomfortable over a shoe, but which to the bare feet of the old negroes were a joy and a comfort. The first rubber shoe was shaped like a large sausage, and from one end along the side a piece was removed to permit the introduction of the foot. After the foot was inserted the elastic substance shaped itself about it.

They were always called "gum shoes." While a medical student I was present at the opening of the Girard House in Philadelphia, and I remember that there were printed notices at each entrance with the request, "Please wipe your gums on the mat."