How MATCHES appeared | History of creation
Chapters:
0:00 Prehistory of the appearance of matches
0:40 Matches by Jean Chansel
1:03 John Walker matches
1:36 Matches Zauria (Soria)
2:52 Lundstrem matches (Swedish matches)
3:35 Types of matches
Matches are a relatively recent invention of mankind; they replaced the flint about two centuries ago.
The history of matches as a means of making fire began with the discovery of phosphorus in 1669 by chemist Brandt. And already in 1680, the Irish physicist Robert Boyle (the same one whose name is named Boyle-Mariotte's law) covered a strip of paper with phosphorus and, striking it with a wooden match with a sulfur head, received fire ... but did not attach any importance to it.
In 1805, the French chemist Jean Chancelle proposed his version of a match with a head made from a mixture of sulfur, potassium chloride and sugar. The kit included a bottle of sulfuric acid, where matches had to be dipped in order to light them. The disadvantage of this type of match is obvious: you should always have sulfuric acid, an unsafe chemical, on hand.
In 1826, the British pharmacist John Walker invented the first friction-lit matches. He made a match head from a mixture of sulfur, potassium chlorate, sugar and antimony sulfide, and made the ignition by striking on sandpaper. True, Walker's matches burned unstably, left a bad memory in the form of a nasty sulfur dioxide gas, scattered clouds of sparks around them when they ignited, and were about 90 cm long.
And in 1830, the French chemist Charles Zauria (or Soria) replaced antimony sulfide with white phosphorus. Such matches burned perfectly, lit with one movement of the head on any rough surface, but ... the smell of white phosphorus burning and splashing around was terrible. In addition, white phosphorus turned out to be very toxic - "phosphorus necrosis" quickly became an occupational disease for workers in match factories. One box of matches at the time contained a lethal dose of white phosphorus, and suicides by swallowed match heads quickly became common.
Replacements for the toxic and flammable white phosphorus were not easy to find.
However, this could only be done by the Swedish chemist Gustav Erik Pasch, who in 1844 realized one simple thing: if a match ignites due to mechanical contact between sulfur and phosphorus, it is not at all necessary to put phosphorus in the match head - it is enough to apply it on a rough surface that is being struck against! This decision, together with the discovery of red phosphorus, which arrived just in time (which, unlike white, does not ignite in air and is much less toxic), formed the basis of the first truly safe matches.
But already in 1853, the Swedish chemist Johan Lundström applied red phosphorus to the surface of sandpaper and replaced it with the same white phosphorus in the head of a match. Such matches were no longer harmful to health, they were easily lit on a previously prepared surface. Johan Lundström patented the first "Swedish match" that has survived to this day almost unchanged. Lundström's matches were a great success at the World's Fair in Paris in 1855, receiving a silver medal for the fact that the way they were made did not threaten the health of workers.
This is how the "safe" or "Swedish" matches finally appeared, which we still use today.
According to the ignition method - on grater (ignited by friction against a special surface - a grater) and beetless (ignited by friction against any surface).
Grated matches of various types are the main mass type of matches all over the world.
Bare matches are produced mainly in England and the USA, in limited quantities.
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How matches appeared | History of creation
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