The Forest Republican. [volume] (Tionesta, Pa.) 1869-1952, 1891-09-09
MATCH MANUFACTURING.
THE SIMPLE INVENTION WHICH
BANISHED THE TINDER.
Sweden is the Great Match Maker
Each Person Uses Eight Day
Wax Watches.

rope aud America, taking the average,
uses eight matches every day in the
year.
Does it not seem wonderful when one
considers the enormous number of matches
which, at that rate, the civilized world
uses each year to light its fires, its pipes
and cigars and other things which re-
quirc iguiting for purposes of everyday
convenience The very notion of getting
on without them seems so absurd that
one does not realize that it is only within
the last sixty years that they have been
procurable. How marvelously cheap they
are, tool In fact, there is no product of
human manufacture that better illustrates
the expense saving advantages Of ma
chinery. When one machine will turn
put 5000, 900 matches in ten hours,
why should not mankind regard the phe-
nomenon of fire as too commonplace to
be worthy of serious consideration.
Sweden is the great match maker of
the world, but the industry is conducted
on an enormous scale in the United States
and other countries. The wood used is
chiefly pine, white or yellow. Timber
for the purpose is cut out in blocks fif-
teea inches long-long enough to make
seven matches. After being freed from
the bark the blocks are put iuto ma
chine resembling a turning lathe, with
fixed cutting tool by which a continuous
strip of veneer is turned off precisely
the thickness of match. While this is
being done small knives separate the
sheet of veneer into seven bands so that
seven long ribbons are produced, the
width of each just the length of the
match that is to be.
Next these ribbons are fed more than
one hundred of them at a time into
another machine, though first they are
cut into siX-foot lengths and the Knolty
parts are removed. This latter contri-
vance chops them into match sticks at
the rate of thousands a minute, which
are afterwards dried in heated drums
p that revolve. The sticks thus prepared
are then sifted to remove all splinters,
and the same apparatus that accomplishes
this purpose arranges them parallel so as
to be conveniently bundled. Finally they
are dipped in combustible mixtures, aud, ],
although this performance is so elabor-
ate as to render a detailed description
undesirable, it is performed with as
much quickness as the process which
went before. From the felled tree to the
finished lucifers all is done by machinery,
the boxing only being executed by
hand.
1t was in 1906 that the notion of
chemical matches was first conceived. In
that year French professor introduced
for the purpose small bottle of asbestos,
saturated with strong sulphuric acid,
into which little sticks Of wood coated
with sulphur and tipped with mixture
of chlorate of potash aud sugar, were to
be introduced when light was wanted.
When the wooden splint thus prepared
was brought in contact with the acid in
the bottle ignition followed.
In the same year matches tipped with
Jumps of phosphorus seem to have been
known, but they caught fire too readily
by spontaneous combustion to render
them very desirable for household use.
An improvement was introduced in 1923,
when equal parts of sulphur and phos-
phorus were melted together in a glass
tube, which was securely corked. When
a light was desired a small stick was
poked into the tube and particle of
mixture withdrawn on the end of it. On
exposure to the air the substance caught
fire spontaneously.
The first really practicable friction
matches were made by an English apothe.
cary named Walker in 1927. He coated
splints of cardboard with sulphur and
tipped them with mixture of sulphate
of antimony, chlorate of potash and gum.
Each box, holding eighty-four matches
and sold for twenty-five cents, contained
also folded piece of glass paper, which
was to be pressed together while the
match was drawn through it. Three
years later another ingenious person
named Jones, in London, patented the
idea of making q small roll of paper,
soaked with chlorate of potash and sugar
at one end, with a thin glass globule
filed with strong sulphuric acid attached
at the same point. When the sulphurc
acid was liberated by pinching the
globule it acted upon the chlorate of pot.
ash and sugar so as to produce fire.
1t was not until 1888 that the phor.
phorus friction match was first introduced
on commercial scale, aud improve
ments rapidly followed, which have pro
duced the fire-making article as it is sold
by the billions of boxes to-day. For {
long time the phosphorus, which has al
ways been the most important ingredient,
was found perilous thing to deal With
1t occasioned multitudinous accidents
and was also the cause of widespread
disease in the factories. This complaint
was of a most dreadful character, caus
ing decay of the jawbones of operatives
but it has been found that ventilation
and cleanliness do away with it. OWN!
TO the danger of fires from the explosion
of matches, the "safety" variety ha
grown much in favor of late years, tn
phosphorus necessary for ignition bein,
combined with the mixture applied tC
the surface of the box, instead Of formn.
part of the tipping substance of th
splints themselves.
Wax matches, so-called, are manurac
tured chiefly in Italy and Great Britain
They are made by drawing strands @
fine cotton thread, twenty or thirty at
time, through melted stearne, with
small admixture Of parafiine. The wa
hardens quickly upon the threads an
the long tapers thus produced al
smoothed and rounded by pulling theI
through iron plates perforated with hole
of the desired size. Finally, the taper