Developed Colors on Cotton Yarn

Wilmington, DE: E.I. Du Pont de Nemours and Company, 1940. Very Good. Wilmington, DE: E.I. Du Pont de Nemours & Company, n.d., ca. 1940s. Second Edition. Quarto (25.5cm.); publisher's maroon gilt-lettered cloth; 37pp.; two-hundred and seventy (270) cotton samples mounted to thick card stock bound throughout text. Boards a bit rubbed along spine margins, gilt rather dulled, contemporary pencil marginalia to final page of samples (Polyform Colors), else Very Good, internally bright and sound. Company compliments card laid in.

Massive and comprehensive trade catalog of cotton dyes offered by the Du Pont Company (simply called DuPont today), (truncated) founded in 1802 as a gunpowder mill turned dye manufacturer in 1922. "From its laboratories and plants has emerged the present line of forty-one products ranging from a brilliant, greenish yellow to a full, bloomy black--each fulfilling a specific need" (p. 2). Introductory text includes dyeing instructions for raw stock, yarns, and pieces goods, followed by a tabulation of fastness properties. The bound-in samples are each accompanied by a table of dye qualities and recipes. A previous owner has laid in a small sample of wove cotton dyed with what appears to be Pontamine Diazo Bordeaux 2BL 1lb ZN or TN. Since the 2017 DuPont merger with Dow Chemical, DuPont has an estimated worth of $130 billion and ranks no. 35 on the 2019 Fortune 500 list. It also sits at no. 2 on the list of toxic water polluters. (Inventory #: 21590)