Abstract

The history of the discovery and early use of chromium chemicals is summarised. The application of chromium salts by Warrington (1841), Cavallin (1845) and DeKercado (1851) is described briefly. Patented processes for the use of chromium salts in the leather trades during the 1860s and 1870s are reviewed. The world wide, commercial-scale operation of the Heinzerling process (1878) is outlined. It is shown that the traditional belief, that chrome tanning was invented by Knapp (1858) and not developed practically until the two-bath tannage of Schultz (1884) and the one-bath tannage of Schultz (1884) and the one-bath method of Dennis (1893) is over-simplistic. It is suggested that the development of chrome tanning in the nineteenth century came from a steady accumulation of knowledge and experience and was not the result of a series of breakthroughs by individual inventors.