"I'm an optimist, but an optimist who carries a raincoat...."
Harold Wilson, former British Prime Minister
It was a Scottish chemist, Charles Macintosh, who gave us one of the most widely recognized names, the
Mackintosh, the eponymous and essential waterproof coat. He invented, not the coat, but the waterproof material from which such garments are made. Macintosh's experiments began with waste products from the process of creating gas from coal. Initially he extracted ammonia from the waste products to make a violet-red dye. This process left a further waste product, called coal-tar naphtha. Macintosh began to experiment with this as a solvent, quickly realizing its waterproof qualities. He began to coat a thin material with it, but encountered two problems: the rubber was sticky, and it had a terrible odor. He combated the first problem by pressing two sheets of the fabric together, with the rubber In the middle, which created a waterproof and usable material, and this he patented in 1823.
Unfortunately the problem of the rubbery smell was never truly overcome, and even today traditional waterproof jackets tend to have a distinct odor. On account of the smell and the slightly unwieldy nature of his material, garments were at first slow to take off, although the armed forces in particular were an early advocate of his waterproof material. Later the British inventor Thomas Hancock (1786-1865) took out a license to produce the double-layer waterproof material and improved upon it, adding a higher percentage of rubber and making it more efficient and less malodorous. Macintosh recognized Hancock's developments and in 1831 Hancock was made a partner in the firm Chas. Macintosh & Co.
