ABSTRACT
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Calico Printer’s Association Limited initiated research in 1940 to develop polyesters for synthetic fiber applications. In 1941, John Rex Whinfield and James Tennant Dickson of the Calico Printer’s Association patented poly(ethylene terephthalate) (PET) [1] based on the early research of Wallace Carothers on condensation polymerization of aliphatic acids such as adipic acid with ethylene glycol (EG), but Carothers had not studied the condensation of EG with aromatic acids such as terephthalic acid (TPA) to produce PET. Whinfield and Dickson, along with inventors W.K. Birtwhistle and C.G. Ritchiethey, also created the first PET polyester fibers called Terylene in 1941 [2] (first manufactured by Imperial Chemical Industries [ICI]). When DuPont learned about the new fibers from ICI (which acquired Calico industries in 1947), it negotiated and purchased patent rights and then proceeded further to commercialization.
