Formica
Devotees of TV home-renovation and decorating shows know that the really important decision in re-doing the family kitchen today has nothing to do with appliances, lighting, or what you put on the floor. No, it’s by your countertops that you will be judged, and many’s the home loan that has been floated to bridge the golden gap betwixt faux marble and the real, preferably imported Italian, article. Whether the subsequent bologna sandwiches taste better for being prepared on such a pricey surface is, of course, debatable.
Back in the 1950s and 60s, however, the fashionable modern home was one whose owners had sprung for the countertop of the future — Formica. By the late 60s and 1970s, in fact, Formica seemed to top nearly every flat surface in the land. Restaurant tables, school desks, retail counters and even the floor of Radio City Music Hall in New York City were all made of sleek, smooth Formica.
For a biology student of the day, the name Formica must have presented a bit of a puzzle. “Formica” is also the genus name of the taxonomic family Formicidae, those pesky little insects better known as “ants.”
Fortunately, there is no connection between the name “Formica” and ants, but the path Formica took from its invention to America’s countertops was a bit convoluted. Way back in 1912, Dan J. O’Conor was a young engineer working for Westinghouse in Pittsburgh when he had a good idea. If you were to coat fabric with resin while it rolled onto a spindle, you could then cut the roll lengthwise, flatten it, and, after curing, you would have a laminate material that would be light, durable, and, most important to O’Conor’s line of work, an excellent electrical insulator. O’Conor promptly took his invention to his bosses at Westinghouse, who agreed that it was a clever idea and paid him, according to standard company policy, the princely sum of one dollar for the patent.
Mr. O’Conor must have been less than thrilled with this treatment, because within weeks he and his friend Herbert A. Faber both quit Westinghouse and started their own company to produce the material. At that time the standard material for electrical insulators was mica, a natural family of minerals. As the new synthetic material was intended as a substitute for mica, the name “Formica” was a natural.
Comments
Got something to say?