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Container of Nylon 66 Pellets

  • ca. 1938
  • Manufactured by E. I. du Pont de Nemours and Company
  • 2.75 in. H x 1.5 in. diameter
    Plastic, nylon
  • On display in Making Modernity
  • Gift of Joseph X. Labovsky
  • The Joseph X. Labovsky Collection
  • 2004.543.203

Description

Nylon, developed in the late 1930s by a team headed by Wallace Carothers at E. I. du Pont de Nemours and Company, was the first totally synthetic fiber. Developed as a replacement for natural silk, Nylon is a simple monomer-chain polymer created by polymerizing a polyamide in a salt mixture.

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