| 1735 |
French
explores discover South American natives playing with
crude rubber balls, making rubber shoes and rubber bottles.
(Charles Marie de la Condamine)….father of the
condom…? Natives call the stuff"CAHUCHU"…weeping
wood. French call it CAOUTCHOUC… |
| 1770 |
English
chemist Joseph Priestly discovers pencil marks are erased
or easily "rubbed out" with caoutchouc…he
think and says, "Blimey! What a Rubber!"
….A STAR is BORN…RUBBER. ( More easily
said too! Quite right. )
|
| 1800"s |
By
now latex has been mixed with turpentine to make waterproof
cloth. McKintosh raincoats, rubber bands, rubber production
machines, erasers of course, and a few other odds and
ends soon follow. But rubber is unstable in extreme
hot and extreme cold weather. Gummy and sticky with
heat, brittle and hard with cold. What to do? |
| 1839 |
Enter
Charles GOODYEAR…(yes, that Goodyear. ), Chuck
accidentally drops a glob of a rubber and sulphur mix
on the stove…VULCANIZED! Cured rubber is
better rubber. Attempts to develop rubber tree plantations
are successful in hot moist climates. The British Empire
transplants seedlings from South American forest to
Ceylon (Sri Lanka) and Malaysia. Almost all of today's
plantations trees come from these seedlings. Tree-mendous
really. |
| 1900's |
Automobile
Boom merges with the new vulcanized
rubber tires to push rubber science farther and faster. |
| 1914 |
Yearly
production of plantation rubber exceeds wild rubber
forest production. Grafting and breeding (of the trees
that is…) over the years have produced trees that
today yield TEN TIMES the rubber of wild trees.
World War I--The blockade of Germany creates critical
need for the German war machine to get rubber for tanks,
trucks, etc.-- search is on for SYNTHETIC RUBBER.
Early efforts do not perform well. |
| 1939 |
By
the beginning of WW II, the Synthetic Rubber need was
NOT going to hinder the Nazi war machine. The Germans
develop two fairly good types of Synthetic Rubber. BUNA
(S)--butadine gas and STYRENE…and BUNA (N) from
butadine and acrylonitrile (liquid from acetylene and
hydro cyanic acid.) |
| 1942 |
Japan
captures ALL of the Far East rubber plantations cutting
off 90% of the U.S. rubber supply. Overnight the U.S.
developed a Synthetic Rubber industry. Today the world
uses more Synthetic Rubber than Natural Rubber. One
challenge to Synthetic Rubber dominance…the ever
growing popularity of radial tires AND…the wondrous
quality derived from TALATECH LATEX mattresses and pillows.
These products use a blend of the highest quality Natural
Rubber and the absolute best Synthetic. |
| 1962 |
Foam
Rubber (latex) mattresses enjoy peak popularity among
the beautiful Americans intelligent enough to own them.
Fierce consumer loyalty is born! I WANT MY LATEX!
(+6% market) |
| 1963 |
One
word,….PLASTICS! Petro chemical polyurethane
plastic foams find their way into every conceivable
corner of our lives! Light weight and cheap, they boost
profits for mattress makers everywhere as padding components.
Tire makers start to discover better profits in hot
rod tires, racing tires, raised white letter tires,
poly-glass tires and radials too. One more word…water
beds! America floats to sleep for the next 20 yr.
The exceptional interest in flotation sleep only adds
to the diminishing availability of quality latex mattresses
throughout the sixties and seventies. |
| 1975 |
ARSON
FIRE! B.F. Goodrich Sponge Rubber,
Shelton, Connecticut. Call the FBI!…50 drums of
explosive fuel ignited the dynamite. BOOM! Perhaps
the largest arson case in FBI history, the sole remaining
latex rubber factory burns to the ground. A poorly designed
attempt at insurance fraud is easily exposed. |
| 1977 |
Bill
Coffey and Steve Kordiak literally pull the latex industry
in America from the ashes of the fire and begin at one
to concentrate on the latex foam rubber pillow market. |
| 1979 |
Latex
Foam Products, Inc. The cosmetic industry discovers
the quality never stops in American made, 100% synthetic
latex applicators. Companies like Clinique, Christain
Dior, L'Oreal and many more line up to send LFP on its
way to an 85% market share in the industry. |
| 1981 |
TALATECH
arrives! Latex Foam Products, Inc. builds the first
American made latex mattress cores in over 5 years.
LFP perfects the Joseph Talalay process of freezing
the latex in a vacuum mold, curing the rubber with heat
and a vigorous wash and dry cycle. These mattress cores
prove superior to all other attempts in history. Exhaustive
quality control standards insure that Talatech products
are the best in the world today. |
| 1990's |
Jonathon
May arrives as president of Latex Foam Products, Inc.
A dynamic leader with a vision of the future and an
extensive level of experience in manufacture and marketing.
John expands the influence of Latex Foam Products in
the European and Asian markets. Europe's centuries old
love affair with latex begins to spill over into the
American Market. 80% of the high end mattress business
in Europe is you guessed it…..LATEX!! |
| |
Performance
Series Mattresses by Talatech
Kevin Callinan, Joh May, and John Coffey, team up to
develop the world's most comfortable beds, the Talatech
Performance series. These exceptional sleep systems
set the stage for dozens of new latex lines form ALL
of America's premier mattress makers. By 1996 23 out
of 24 brands use Talatech latex cores and mattress toppers
in constructing better quality sleep sets.
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