Rensselaer Union, Volume 10, Number 43, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 11 July 1878 — HOW MATCHES ARE MADE. [ARTICLE]

HOW MATCHES ARE MADE.

Our constant use of the indispensable mate]* has made it so familiar that Erobably few have ever thought to ask ow our ancestors did without it, and by what stages such a necessary article was brought to its present perfection. Yet matches did not come into common use until within the present century, and their history is marked by the same stages of progress and improvement as other inventions. Among rude Nations tire was obtained by rubbing together two pieces of wood, and the first improvement upon this troublesome plan was the use of the flint and steel, one of the earliest devices of civilization. Out of this grew'the old tinder-box, an ingenious but intricate arrangement familiar to the past generation, but now relegated to a place among the antiquities. As such it is deserving of a short description. The tinder consisted of carbon in a filmy form, usually procured by burning an old rag. The steel was a strip of hard iron, curved round at the top and bottom so as to form a handle. This was held in the left band, and in the right a flint wedge, the sharp edge of which being struck against the steel, chipped off minute fragments. The heat developed by the percussion was sufficient to ignite and even fuse these metallic fragments, which, falling down into the easily combustible carbon, ignited it without difficulty. The operator then, blowing upon the tinder to keep up combustion, applied a small piece of wood, previously dipped in sulphur, to the glowing carbon, and witn some little contrivance managed to ignite the sulphur, which in its turn ignited the wood. The operation was not, however, always successful. The tinder or the matches might be damp, the flint blunt, and the steel worn, or on a dark morning the operator would not unfrequently sirjjke his or her knuckles instead of the steel. That this occurred so frequently as to causo common complaint is shown by the following advertisement, which.circulated extensively not so many years ago: “Save your knuckles, time and trouble: Use Huerntner’s Eupyrion; price, one shilling.” In the Eupyrion flame was produced by bringing sulphuric acid into contact with an inflammable substance mixed with chlorate of potash. This device proved, however, to be scarcely less expensive and troublesome than the tinder-box. The discovery of phosphorus in 1678 disclosed an entirely new method of obtaining fire. In 1680 Godfrey Hankwitz, at nis laboratory near the Strand, London, manufactured and sold large quantities of phosphorus for this purpose, and so great was the fame of the new method tnat he undertook a traveling tour in order to exhibit and sell the article. The costliness of phosphorus probably prevented its general introduction, and it is remarkable that a century and a half should have elapsed before this substance was commonly used in the manufacture of matches. At first the phosphorus was ignited by rubbing it between folds of brown paper ana applying the match dipped in sulphur. Later it was customary to partially burn a small piece of phosphorus In the confined air of a small vial, the effect of which was to line it with oxide of phosphorus. The vial was then corked, and when required for use, a sulphur match was dipped into it. The match was either ignited by the chemical action produced, or by afterward rubbing it upon a cork. There is one difficulty attendant upon the manufacture of matches which makes it an employment to be shunned by those who are able to find some other means of subsistence. The acid fumes thrown off by the phosphorus during the various processes frequently cause among the people employed a terrible disease, which attacks the teeth and Jaws. To such an extent did it prevail at onetime in Germany that the attention of the Government was called to it. The dippers are most likely to suffer in this way, in consequence of having to stand for hours over the heated slab upon which the phosphorus is spread. Persons with decayed teeth are the most susceptible to this disease, and therefore they are carefully excluded from the factories. Indeed, the principal employes are young people of both sexfefl. No antidote haa yet been discovered, and the natural course of the disease is to rot the entire jaw-bone away. This generally occupies several years, with a constant discharge of matter inside and outside the mouth. The pain is not very acute, but the sufferer seldom survives the natural course of the disease. Some*

Aimed an operation is successful, and many have been .performed at the New York Hospital. Sometimc'it has been found: necessary, }to remov'd the whole of the jaw-bone. Thorough ventilation and careful attention to cleanli-ness-will do much toward preventing the disease-in the beginning, and these points are sedulously regarded in the better dads of match, manufactories. It is a fact worthy of notice that, insignificant as matches appear, it is a matter of importance, on account of the immense numbers made, that manufactories should be situated in localities wnero timber Is cheap. Beside the matches, splints are exported to the West Indies and South America, where, within a few years, match manufactories have been established. As for the idAtchefi themselves, the United States furnish, to a great extent, dot orfly the remote portions of our .own continent, but alto send them id large quantities to the East Indies, Australia and China. —Harper's Wcikly.