LowPolygon
Senior Member
I had no idea the Gooderham people were involved in chemical production as well. The scenes give me the shivers though: modern chemistry and chemical production involves minimal personal contact with these agents, layers of personal protective equipment, and static-discharge devices. I wonder how many injuries were experienced in this facility?
I didn't know this either. Came across this in a collection of oral interviews with G&W employees:
"As I understood it, Trinity Street closed during the first World War when it became
a war plant producing acetone. They put the fence around it. Actually, it was patrolled
from inside by armed guards and what have you. The story goes, and I heard this from
O.D. Johnston and some things I have read about, that during the first World War, the
British were losing the battle and so they did a survey of the front line officers and asked,
"What's the problem?". They said, "Well, we can't spit at them, we need ammunition.".
At the time, production of cordite required acetone. Acetone was being produced by all
the British distillers as much as they could produce but it was not enough. So, the
Gooderhams, being expatriate Brits, were approached by the British government because
G & W, at that time, was the largest distillery in the world, and the Gooderhams turned
over the production plant to acetone entirely and didn't charge them. They changed the
name to British Acetones and very shortly after that, tank car after tank car - there are
some pictures of rail lines of tank cars outside the property - were going to Britain. I am
not sure where I got this information, maybe Stephen [Otto, historian] or Mike Filey told
me, but there was a change in the fighting during that period of time. There was sort of a
lull in the fighting and apparently the British Secret Service let out information on
purpose to say something like there was going to be a big push months from now. So, the
Germans stopped the offensive to prepare for this big push and it was really created so
they could get more acetone in Britain, to delay, to get the ammunition back up again."