Catalogue description PAPERS RELATING TO WILLIAM PERKIN

Series 1: Perkin's Papers (2 boxes)

Lectures notes and notebooks, correspondence (1856-1906), photographs, company articles, Royal Society documents,

Series 2: Research and Patents (1 box)

Published papers, official correspondence, speeches, and books relating to the discovery of mauveine.

Series 3: Press Cuttings and Obituaries (1 box)

Articles published about Perkin, during his lifetime and after, press cuttings, obituary notices, family tree,

Series 4: Perkin Family Papers (1 box)

Photos of Perkin, papers relating to Perkin Centennial, hymn service sheets for William Perkin and Alexandrine Perkin's burials

Series 5: Seals and Objects (2 boxes and 11 loose objects)

Perkin Jubilee memorabilia, textile dye specimens, skein dyes with Mauve, seals and stamp, piece of floor of Perkin's laboratory.

Series 6: Awards and Medals

Illuminated addresses, souvenirs from honorary degree ceremonies, medal,

Other sources of information

Simon Garfield, Mauve: How One Man Invented a Colour that Changed the World, Faber and Faber, 2000

M.R. Fox, Dye-Makers of Great Britain, 1856-1976: A History of Chemists, Companies, Products and Changes, ICI, 1987, esp. pp. 94-101

http://www.ch.ic.ac.uk/perkin.html

The archive is on loan to the museum of Science and Industry for a period of 25 years. It was previously held at ICI then Zeneca Specialities in Blackley, Manchester. It was transferred to the Museum of Science and Industry in Manchester in 1998. The joint custodians of the collection are Helen Beaufoy and Michael Kirkpatrick

• Perkin, Sir William Henry, 1838-1907, Knight, chemist

Collected c.1956

Biographical notes

William Henry Perkin (1838-1907)

'I am glad to hear that a rage for your colour has set in among that all powerful class of the community - the Ladies. If they once take a mania for it and you can supply the demand, your fame and fortune are secure.'

Letter from Robert Pullar to W.H. Perkin, 14 May 1857

Perkin has become known as the discoverer of a colour, and the founder of a massive industry. In 1856, aged 18, he made a substance which could dye silk a purple colour, which he named mauve. Perkin's discovery virtually created the coal tar industry for he had found a way to make dyes using aniline; a colourless aromatic oil derived from coal tar. Coal tar is a by-product of the gas industry. To manufacturers it was a waste product and they literally gave it away. Its only use was for waterproofing mackintoshes. Yet after Perkin's discovery, coal tar became the basis of saccharine production, the pharmaceutical industry, and the perfume industry.

Perkin's father, George Fowler Perkin, was a builder. Wishing his son to move up in the world, he had pushed him to become an architect. However, when William was twelve years old, a friend showed him how soda and alum crystallise. At the age of 14 he began to attend the City of London School, then in Milk Street, off Cheapside. The school was virtually the only one in Britain to teach science as a practical subject. Perkin was taught chemistry and physics by Thomas Hall, who knew the famous chemist A.W. Hofmann. Perkin quickly made progress and was allowed to assist Hall in setting up experiments for lectures. Hall encouraged him in his interest and introduced him to Hofmann who ran the Royal College of Chemistry. Perkin left the School for the Royal College when he was 16. The College later became the Royal College of Science and, in 1907, it was one of the founding bodies of Imperial College.

At 17, Perkin became Hoffman's research assistant. He also worked at a rudimentary laboratory in his home during the evenings and at weekends. It was during the Easter vacation of 1856 that Perkin discovered mauve. He had been trying to make quinine - then in demand as a treatment for malaria. However, whilst trying to oxidise aniline using potassium dichromate, Perkin made a black precipitate. Rather than throw it away, Perkin tried to remove the colour and found that the resulting coloured solution would turn silk purple. Perkin decided not to return to college - an extremely important step given how difficult it was to make a living from such a discovery. He patented the dye on the 26 August 1856. The patent documentation describes Perkin as a chemist, and the patent is for 'producing a new colouring matter for dyeing with a lilac or purple colour stuffs of silk, cotton, wool, or other materials.'

Perkin's next step was to attempt to interest cloth dyers and printers in his discovery, yet he had no experience of the textile trade and little knowledge of commercial, large-scale chemical. Perkin's luck changed towards the end of 1857 when the Empress Eugénie, wife of Napoleon III, decided that mauve was the colour to wear. In January 1858 Queen Victoria followed suit, wearing mauve to her daughter's wedding. Perkin's success was assured - he was the only person in Britain who could produce the colour in any quantity.

Perkin had difficulties in finding backers and a site for a factory, but fortunately his father and elder brother decided to support his venture. George Perkin sank all his savings into building a factory at Greenford Green, near Harrow, Middlesex. Aided by George's building experience, construction was rapid. They began in late spring 1857, and by December of that year, Perkin and Sons was able to supply mauve to silk dyers.

This was a remarkably quick turn around - less than two years between discovery and large-scale manufacture. It is an even more striking feat when you realise the problems Perkin encountered. Nobody had previously produced aniline, or a chemical like it, on such a scale. Perkin had to invent and adapt apparatus and then find manufacturers prepared and able to follow his instructions. He found that existing apparatus was too crude to produce the refined and pure chemicals that he needed. And the unrefined chemicals themselves were hard to get hold of. Benzene, needed to make aniline, was rare. The strong nitric acid needed to nitrate the benzene was too expensive and so Perkin devised a way of making nitrobenzene from soda, saltpetre and sulphuric acid.

Perkin went on to work with other aniline-based dyes and Perkin and Sons continued to be successful. Yet the dye industry was becoming increasingly crowded as more firms used the basic techniques which Perkin had developed. Aged 36, Perkin sold the factory and retired from industry. Perkin built on his reputation as a chemist, continuing to research at home. He was secretary and president of the Chemistry Society. After the discovery of mauve, Perkin found a way of making unsaturated aromatic acids such as cinnamic acid. This method of making the acids became known as Perkin's reaction. He also found a way to synthesise coumarin - the odorous part of the Tonka bean - which is used to make artificial perfumes. However, his former company fared less well. The buyers did not make a success of it and in fact tried and failed to sue the Perkin family for providing them with false information about the profitability of the company at the time of sale.

Perkin's sons were also very successful chemists. The eldest, William Henry Perkin junior, was professor of organic chemistry at Victoria University, Manchester and became Waynflete Professor of Chemistry at Oxford in 1912. The second son, Arthur George Perkin, began his career working for Hardman and Holden, an alizarin factory in Manchester. In 1916 he became professor of colour chemistry and dyeing at the University of Leeds. Frederick Mollwo, the third son, from Perkin's second marriage became an industrial chemist.

• View Record