I have dropped the 16 H's or hydrogen atoms of the formula for
simplicity's sake. They simply hook on wherever they can. You will see
that the isoprene consists of a chain of four carbon atoms (represented
by the C's) with an extra carbon on the side. In the transformation of
this colorless liquid into soft rubber two of the double linkages break
and so permit the two chains of 4 C's to unite to form one ring of
eight. If you have ever played ring-around-a-rosy you will get the idea.
In Chapter IV I explained that the anilin dyes are built up upon the
benzene ring of six carbon atoms. The rubber ring consists of eight at
least and probably more. Any substance containing that peculiar carbon
chain with two double links C=C-C=C can double up--polymerize, the
chemist calls it--into a rubber-like substance. So we may have many
kinds of rubber, some of which may prove to be more useful than that
which happens to be found in nature.

With the structural formula of Harries as a clue chemists all over the
world plunged into the problem with renewed hope. The famous Bayer dye
works at Elberfeld took it up and there in August, 1909, Dr. Fritz
Hofmann worked out a process for the converting of pure isoprene into
rubber by heat. Then in 1910 Harries happened upon the same sodium
reaction as Matthews, but when he came to get it patented he found that
the Englishman had beaten him to the patent office by a few weeks.

This Anglo-German rivalry came to a dramatic climax in 1912 at the great
hall of the College of the City of New York when Dr. Carl Duisberg, of
the Elberfeld factory, delivered an address on the latest achievements
of the chemical industry before the Eighth--and the last for a long
time--International Congress of Applied Chemistry. Duisberg insisted
upon talking in German, although more of his auditors would have