Instruments & Innovation

Electric-powered meter with instructions housed in wooden box. Movable components within box: two (2) slide glass filters (1 with red, green, and blue slides; 1 with orange, green, and blue slides); one (1) encasing to…

Two views of an unidentified employee adjusting the Stern Shredder machine at the Hercules Powder Company plant in Hopewell, Virginia. The shredder was used to process linter sheets of cellulosic fibrous materials, such…

General view of an unidentified employee inspecting control switches at the Hercules Powder Company plant in Hopewell, Virginia. Per notations accompanying the photograph, the control switches were explosion-proof, one…

General view of an unidentified employee inspecting the Hydrochloride Rotary System at the Hercules Powder Company plant in Hopewell, Virginia. The system was likely used during the production of so-called "chemical…

General view of an unidentified employee inspecting the control board for a Solvent Recovery system at the Hercules Powder Company plant in Hopewell, Virginia. Per notations accompanying the photograph, the system was…

General view of an unidentified employee examining a control panel used in the production of ethyl cellulose at the Hercules Powder Company plant in Hopewell, Virginia. Ethyl cellulose manufactured by the Hercules…

General view of an unidentified employee examining a control panel used in the production of ethyl cellulose at the Hercules Powder Company plant in Hopewell, Virginia. Ethyl cellulose manufactured by the Hercules…

Close-up view of an unidentified employee removing a sample of ethyl cellulose from a machine at the Hercules Powder Company plant in Hopewell, Virginia. Per notations accompanying the photograph, the sampling was one…

Close-up view of ethyl cellulose being transferred to a storage bin at the Hercules Powder Company's Ethyl Cellulose plant in Hopewell, Virginia. The employee visible in the photograph is unidentified. Ethyl cellulose…

General view of weigh-tanks for caustic soda and ethyl cellulose at the Hercules Powder Company's Ethyl Cellulose plant in Hopewell, Virginia. Per notations accompanying the photograph, caustic soda and ethyl cellulose…

General view of the interior of a portion of the Hercules Powder Company plant facilities in Hopewell, Virginia, with view of assorted industrial apparatus and machinery and several unidentified employees. The Hopewell…

General view of an unidentified female employee inspecting a treating tub used to purify ethyl cellulose at the Hercules Powder Company plant in Hopewell, Virginia. The Hopewell plant commonly produced ethyl cellulose,…

General view of a female employee cutting strands of .50 caliber powder extruded from a press to the proper length at the Radford Ordnance Works in Radford, Virginia. The Radford Ordnance Works was operated by the…

General view of a section of the interior of the Cliffs Dow wood distillation plant located in Marquette, Michigan. Seeking a source of raw material for its new plastic, ethylcellulose, the Dow Chemical Company joined…

General view of a section of the interior of the Cliffs Dow wood distillation plant located in Marquette, Michigan. Seeking a source of raw material for its new plastic, ethylcellulose, the Dow Chemical Company joined…

A: Microscope
Ernst Leitz oil-immersion microscope; instrument rests on wishbone-shaped base with a single beam extending from the center before splitting into two sections: an arm supporting the telescope and…

A: Cast iron base attached to a sloping cast iron upright supporting the reader, prisms, sample cups, plungers, and a mechanism for raising and lowering the sample cups; two metal knobs control the height of the sample…

Two views of hot relaxing plates on a drawing machine used at the DuPont plant in Seaford, Delaware during the early stages of synthetic fiber production and research. The plate on the left was electric-heated and the…

Two views of a two-position tire cord machine used during the early stages of synthetic fiber production and research at DuPont. The hot pin and hot plate tandem apparatus used to draw various fibers is visible in both…

Detail view of a steam-spinning apparatus with central booster pump on a Type-8 spinning machine used during the early stages of synthetic fiber production and research at DuPont. The photograph is captioned "Figure…

Two close-up views of an electric-heated grid and steam-spinning grid and block assembly used during the early stages of synthetic fiber production and research at DuPont. The photographs are captioned "Figure 1" and…

Close-up view of a tandem hot-pin hot-plate draw system used at DuPont during the early stages of synthetic fiber production and research. The photograph has been marked with several hand-drawn lines to depict the…

General view of a 50-pound autoclave first used for the production of "Fiber V," later branded as Dacron polyester fiber, at a DuPont semiworks facility. During production, a partially-evaporated salt solution was fed…

General view of a roll crimper and puller used at DuPont during the early stages of synthetic fiber production and research. Typically, such machinery was used to stretch, strengthen, and crimp textile fibers.

General view of a roll crimper used to crimp textile fibers during the early stages of synthetic fiber production and research at DuPont. As visible in this photograph, fibers entered the machine via drive pulleys and…