Nylon

Abstract

At one time “nylons” was synonymous with “stockings”, but the terminology has fallen out of use as, to a large extent, as has the wearing of stockings. Nylons were introduced as an affordable alternative to silk stockings and were an instant hit. Nylon was invented at E. I. du Pont de Nemours and Company, Wilmington, DE, U.S.A. by the American chemist Wallace Carothers (1896–1937) in 1935 and in 1939, the year that Nylon stockings first went on sale, 64 million pairs were sold. This use declined rapidly to zero along with other commercial uses of Nylon, such as making toothbrush bristles, during the Second World War as Nylon was diverted to the U.S. war effort to make tire cords, flak vests, ropes and parachutes. The latter application arose when Asian supplies of silk that had been used to make parachutes dried up.