AN INVENTOR'S DEATH

Evening Post, Volume CXI, Issue 71, 25 March 1931, Page 13

AN INVENTOR'S DEATH

MERCERISED MATERIAL

When pooplo buy mercerised stockings or mercerised material, probably not one in a hundred spare a thought for the. inventor of tho process, or even .know of the inventor.. It was a Mr. Horace Lowe, of Manchester, and he has recently died; consequently the London papers tell his full story, and, as is tho way of the world,' he wins more honour and fame after his death than during his life. .Mr. Lowe worked as a chemist in tho Maeelesfield Silk Works at Manchester over forty years ago, and it was here that he discovered the process of giving cotton yarn that lustre which is known as mercerisation. A John Mercer had made the discovery previously, but his method was bad— tho fibres of the material were coarsened, and the material shrank. Mr. Lowo discovered that if> the yarns of materials were treated under tension and washed, then, when the tension was removed, as by a miracle, the silken sheen was there. Moreover, it was permanent, and the material did not shrink. Mr. Lowe took out patents, but ho received so little encouragement that lie lot them ..lapse; then whon cotton materials became fashionable the process was taken up; the secret became public, and mercerised goods enjoyed a popularity which still lasts. But the inventor was forgotten. He waited forty years .for any kind of recognition. Then in 1928 he was made an honorary fellow of the -Textile Institute. Now, at his death, comes this belated recognition.