ABSTRACT
This 35-year period was a turbulent one for the Muspratt family and their businesses. Besides the usual periodic family celebrations and bereavements, Edmund and Max expanded their professional activities while at the same time coping with many difficult business decisions. Their businesses, together with all other Leblanc businesses, faced major changes in ownership and operation with the formation of the United Alkali Company (UAC) as the industry faced up to national and international commercial challenges. Then, just over 10 years after UAC’s formation, the world faced the horrors of the First World War with its disruptions and tragic loss of so many innocent young lives. Significantly, the war had a remarkable effect on the technical ability of UAC, as with many other businesses, to meet the urgent need for chemicals whether for manufacturing armaments or warfare agents such as poisonous gases. The aftermath of the War necessitated major changes in economics, diplomacy and social policies to meet new challenges – unemployment, recession and new international political and economic orders. For businesses in the British chemical industry, the response was rationalization with the formation of Imperial Chemical Industries (ICI) in 1926. Edmund and Max were to play important roles as these events unfolded.
