When the Tierra del Fuegans,
a primitive people living at the inhospitable southern tip of
South America, were first discovered by Magellan, they had no
knowledge of how to start a fire. They simply waited for nature
to produce it and then kept it going for years on end. Israelites
in the Old Testament were rubbing sticks together to produce
fire. The Ancient Greeks gave us the word “match,”
which is derived from their word for dried fungus, which was
saved up to ignite by flint-produced sparks. Archimedes started
fires by directing the sun’s rays through a lens. Things
developed rather slowly for the next 2000 years. By the early
1800s, the tinderbox was a standard ingredient in every home
and in every gentleman’s pocket. But, as Charles Dickens
once complained, with luck, one might get a fire from a tinderbox
in half an hour on a damp day!
In 1827, however, a French chemistry student, Charles Sauria,
discovered the principle of the phosphorus match. After watching
a demonstration of the reaction of sulphur mixed with Chlorate
of Potash, Sauria eventually experimented by rubbing the prepared
end of his match on a wall where there was some phosphorous.
His match immediately ignited, and so did the development of
the match industry! The first phosphorous friction matches in
the United States were manufactured in 1836.
A few short years later, by 1850, there were 60 match factories
in the entire country. In that same year, the first such factory
opened in California. New York, with 18, was far ahead in both
number and production. Connecticut was second with nine, and
Massachusetts was third with eight. By 1860, the number of plants
had increased to 75. The industry then employed 604 men and 648
women, many working part time or at home.
By 1880, however, the number of match manufacturers dropped from
a high of 79 to 37. As the larger companies had become mechanized,
smaller businesses that used older, less efficient machines,
or still relied on hand-made techniques, had been pushed to the
edge of failure. Many had been forced to shut down after the
stock market crash of 1873 led to a deep depression. To make
matters worse, the nation’s two largest match companies
were deadlocked in a ruinous price war.
Swift & Courtney & Beecher, a consolidation of three
match makers, had entered St. Louis and the Midwest from the
East Coast. Accordingly, O.C. Barber built a factory in Philadelphia
and cut prices even further. Swift & Courtney & Beecher
struck back by introducing new and cheaper brands. Between 1878
and 1880, Barber’s company lost about $90,000. He and William
Swift, president of Swift & Courtney & Beecher, finally
agreed that they were each cutting their own throats and that
a merger would be best for everyone. The two great giants of
the industry, and ten other companies, merged to form the Diamond
Match Company of Connecticut in December, 1880, although production
didn’t begin until early 1881. With the formation of Diamond,
and its purchases of the rights to Joshua Pusey's matchbook in
1894, among others, the American match industry, as we know it,
was born.
Although, worldwide, the
20th century industry was dominated by Swedish Match (and still
is), here at home the domestic industry was ruled by the Big
Five: Diamond, Universal, Lion, Ohio, and D.D. Bean. The American
match industry reached its height in the 1940s and 1950s. It
should be noted, however, that D.D. Bean's "slice"
of the industry was basically vending machine matches. Its matchbooks
were cheap, poorly made and usually disdained by collectors.
In 1991, though, after acquiring new four-color printing equipment,
D.D. Bean introduced the first Joe Camel cigarette set. Since
then, their covers have been slick and attractive.
By the mid-1980s, the industry
had collapsed here in the United States. It just couldn't compete
any longer with foreign imports and declining sales dues to anti-smoking
campaigns.. Most of the previous great companies were gone. Today,
with anti-smoking legislation and fewer smokers, match manufacturing
is an endangered industry. There is only one domestic manufacturer
left: D. D. Bean, still dominates the resale/vending market.
Diamond closed its last plant in 2017. Canada's great producer,
Eddy Match, had also disappeared. There are no manufacturers
left in Canada. |
