Seen above are miners digging out anthracite coal.

Zinc: The other white paint.

By Frank Piazza

No one could have guessed that something as common and as simple as lead paint

would be as harmful as to cause serious medical complications, including birth defects,

constant migraines and sometimes even death. Paint was made this way for hundreds of

years, but Phillip Landrigan found that any levels above 0.06% (dry mass%) can cause

harm to anyone exposed, especially children who were still developing. This caused its

subsequent ban in 1978. Fortunately for the paint industry, other chemicals such as zinc,

had already been used for many years and was ready to become the replacement. A

Philadelphia man, Samuel Wetherill, had invented a process over 100 years before the

ban of lead paint that helped to create the zinc we still use in every day items, such as
rubber, ceramics, plastics, paints, and cosmetics. It is used to galvanize iron to prevent

rusting as well and these are just a few uses of zinc. And it all started, because Samuel

Wetherill was interested about a different paint, not even knowing what he’d be

impacting.

First a brief understanding is need of what Wetherill came up with. The ores used

are broken down into about 0.5 inch diameter, dried, and then pulverized more. The ore

rocks are separated into five grades. They are then placed on grate-bars inside the

Wetherill furnace. On top of the ores, a layer of anthracite coal about the size of a pea is

spread out. The reason for the smaller size is to maximize the area that the coal is

exposed. Anthracite coal is used also because it has the highest carbon count out of any

coal leading to a better reduction of the ore. The ratio of ore to coal is 2 to 1 by mass.

After “thorough ignition” of the furnace, zinc is reduced from the zinc oxide that was in

the ore to zinc vapor. Immediately after that, the metallic zinc vapor is oxidized back into

a zinc oxide vapor. Normally, other furnaces have trouble with this type of behavior.

They can’t generate enough heat and can’t separate the product from the waste. The

furnace process by Wetherill made the zinc and zinc oxide pure enough that it naturally

separated from the ash and floated up into a bag system for collection. This also helped to

separate out smaller impurities. Wetherill eventually added into the furnace, a thin film of

water that purified the zinc from the waste even more. The bags that collected the zinc

numbered over 70. Before long, the Pennsylvania and Lehigh Zinc works became the

third largest producer in the world.

 Seen above is most of what Wetherill created, process wise.

Samuel Wetherill was smart and already had experience in how to make paints.

His grandfather, also Samuel Wetherill, helped to establish the white lead paint business

in the U.S. and business was continued by his father, John Wetherill. Samuel Wetherill

worked for the family company but his innovation took place when he began work for the

New Jersey Zinc company in 1850. He was hired to figure out a way to make a more pure

zinc. However, Wetherill had already been investigating ways to purify zinc from ores,

and now he was given opportunity. After just two years of study and experimentation,

Wetherill had come up with a profitable process for making zinc oxide straight from the

ore. At the same time, another man within the company developed a way to capture the

zinc vapor. Wetherill would not stay employed much longer by the New Jersey Zinc

company. A man named Robert Earp owned a large amount of land in what is now
Bethlehem PA and contacted Wetherill about a possible purchase. This area was rich in

the red zinc ores Wetherill used in his purification process but couldn’t be used very well

in the other zinc purification processes that were currently around. In a fashion that

Wetherill became known for, he bought all of the land. Afterwards, he went back to the

NJZ Co. and offered the land as well as his process. According to a manuscript from one

of his sons, “The management told Wetherill that he will not get his asking price and

could even be sued. They offered $5,000, which he promptly rejected by handing in his

resignation.” Wetherill became known for this type of behavior. While it may seem short

sighted, Wetherill still set up the very first zinc purification process in 1853, very little

over a year after leaving his employ. With the help of a few New York stock investors

and his friend Charles Gilbert. Around 1857, Joseph Wharton took over the company but

Wetherill continued to stay employed at the Pennsylvania and Lehigh Zinc Company.

When Wharton took over the Penn & Lehigh Zinc Co. Wetherill continually took

material out of the company pockets for experimentation without giving much results, or

even asking for that matter. Again though, Wetherill did achieve something. He actually

had the very first piece of zinc sheet metal made in 1859 after spending much time and

company money on making the zinc pure enough for the sheet. This led to an eventual

addition onto the Penn & Lehigh Zinc Co. building to fabricate the sheet metal in 1865.
 Seen above is zinc sheet metal.

It is difficult to continue talking about Wetherill’s person. He left almost no notes,

lab or otherwise and mostly kept to himself. He wed a Quaker, tolerated gambling, loved

horse-racing, and was involved in politics but only to a minor extent. He had enlisted in

the Civil war in 1861 and organized his own cavalry company which he became

commanding officer. In 1864 he was honorably discharged but not before achieving the

rank of Lieutenant-Colonel. People that knew Samuel Wetherill said he was

unpredictable but still very cheerful, cordial, and approachable. He did have a certain

way about that that continually got him into some kind of trouble. The experimentation

with making sheet metal was done with company money and time, and multiple failures

were had which was seen as a waste of time/money. Wetherill supervised an addition to

the Lehigh Zinc Co. building and was scolded by Wharton because it took a few months

too many and cost a lot more money than warranted. Wetherill had 7 children with his
first wife, and then three more with his second. He eventually died in Oxford, Maryland

where he went after retirement.

This process effects our every day lives. Zinc is the third most used non-iron

containing metal on the planet. Zinc is used to make brass, an alloy of zinc and copper. It

highly used in pennies. Every penny since about 1983 is made with 97.5% zinc and only

2.5% copper. Iron is coated in zinc to protect it from rusting over and becoming nearly

useless. Though an odd man, Wetherill allowed for so much to happen without even

realizing it. Today we all owe thanks to him for saving countless lives, and improving

quality of life for so many others.

Early zinc works in the Lehigh Valley

R. D. Billinger
J. Chem. Educ., 1936, 13 (2), p 60
DOI: 10.1021/ed013p60
Publication Date: February 1936

Samuel Wetherill, Joseph Wharton, and the Founding of the American Zinc
Industry, W. Ross Yates
The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography, Vol. 98, No. 4 (Oct., 1974), pp.
469-514
(article consists of 46 pages)
Published by: Historical Society of Pennsylvania
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20090901
Handbook of Metallurgy, Carl Schnabel, Ver. 2 1898 Macmillan and Co. limited.

A history of American manufactures from 1608 to 1860 3d ed. / rev. and enl. With an
introd. by Louis M. Hacker. Bishop, J. Leander (John Leander), 1820-1868.

Dictionary of American biography. [computer file], Charles Scribner's Sons, c1997