General view of Plexiglas plotting and status boards in use at an Air Force communications school located at Keesler Field in Biloxi, Mississippi. As visible in the photograph, personnel receive reports from radar operators and chart the changing positions of aircraft in the area, using a special crayon to write of the back surface of the Plexiglas. All data, lines, and circles marked on the surface of the transparent acrylic plastic sheets are illuminated by light traveling through the Plexiglas from sources concealed at the edges.

The Rohm and Haas Company was founded in 1907 in Esslingen, Germany through the partnership of German chemist Otto Röhm and German businessman Otto Haas. In 1933, Röhm's experiments with the polymerization of methyl methacrylate led to the creation of a clear, solid plastic sheet, which he trademarked Plexiglas. During World War II, the demand for Plexiglas, which both Allied and Axis forces used for submarine periscopes and aircraft windshields, canopies, and gun turrets, helped transform Rohm and Haas into a major chemical firm.