Birthplace of Nylon (DuPont, 1939)
Seaford, Sussex County, Delaware
Marker Inscription
At this site on December 15, 1939, DuPont began commercial production of nylon. Among the earliest successes of a fundamental research program novel in the American chemical industry, nylon was the first totally synthetic fiber to be fashioned into consumer products. Prepared wholly with materials readily derived from coal, air, and water, nylon has properties superior to its natural counterparts, such as silk. Nylon revolutionized the textile industry and led the way for a variety of synthetic materials that have had enormous social and economic impact on the fabric of everyday life worldwide.
Erected by American Chemical Society National Historic Chemical Landmarks
The Story
On the eve of World War II, a DuPont laboratory in Seaford turned a decade of fundamental chemical research into the world's first fully synthetic fiber. Spun from materials drawn out of coal, air, and water, nylon promised strength and elasticity to rival silk, and its December 1939 debut opened an age of synthetics that reshaped clothing, industry, and everyday life.
Why it matters
Seaford marks the moment American industrial research first turned a laboratory discovery into a mass-market material, launching the modern synthetics revolution.
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Related events
- · First commercial production of nylon, December 15, 1939
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Wallace Carothers
Seaford, DE · est. 2000
At the DuPont laboratories, chemist Wallace Carothers began pioneering studies here in 1928 into 'giant molecules,' confirming that long chains of repeating units — polymers — could be built by design. His research led swiftly to neoprene, the first American synthetic rubber, in 1932, and in 1939 to nylon, the world's first fully synthetic textile fiber. Carothers laid the scientific groundwork for the age of plastics before his death in 1937.
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