To be or not to be: that is the question: Whether 'tis nobler to stay at home or go abroad

摘要

As has been chronicled, historically the Chemical Industry in Germany - or more precisely the industry hugging the banks of the Rhine, from Basel to Rotterdam has a very strong relationship with the world wide tanning industry. The region was the all-important cradle of the modern chemical industry when Europe was home to more than 50% of the worlds tanning industry. It is less than 100 years since chrome began its rise as the industry's main tanning agent; in 1912 BASF started the first production of a syntan, following the patent of Professor Stiasny at the Technical High School of Darmstadt. Many auxiliaries, such as the use of sulphated oils in fatliquoring, only began around 1930 and the real beginning of synthetic dyes was not much earlier.