The Electric Smelting and Aluminum Company, founded as Cowles Electric Smelting and Aluminum Company, and Cowles Syndicate Company, Limited, formed in the United States and England during the mid-1880s to extract and supply valuable metals. Founded by two brothers from Ohio, the Cowles companies are remembered for producing alloys in quantity sufficient for commerce. Their furnaces were electric arcsmelters, one of the first viable methods for extracting metals.
United States—before 1895, the Cowles Electric Smelting and Aluminum Company Cowles Syndicate Company, Limited, Staffordshire, England
The businesses of the era dramatically increased the supply of aluminium, a plentiful resource not found in nature in pure form, and reduced its price. The Cowles process was the immediate predecessor to the Hall-Héroult process—today in nearly universal use more than a century after it was discovered by Charles Martin Hall and Paul Héroult and adapted by others including Carl Josef Bayer. Because of the patent landscape, the Cowles companies found themselves in court. Judges eventually acknowledged their innovations many years after the companies formed, and one brother received two separate settlements.[1]
The family had purchased a copperzinc mine on the Pecos River in New Mexico in 1883. Eugene that year designed a furnace to extract zinc from the mine's ores. Two young employees were testing four furnaces in a Cleveland laboratory by 1885.[4] Their first plant was built to extract aluminium, in 1886 using hydropower from a tailrace of Niagara Falls on the Niagara River.[5]
Adolphe Minet wrote a sympathetic assessment twenty years later in 1905 from the perspective of Paris. The Cowles furnace was electrochemical, one of two kinds of processes applied to producing aluminum during the 19th century, and belonged to the electrothermic group that includes Héroult (alloys), Brin, Bessemer, Stephanite and Moissan (carbide). Minet thought Cowles was the first great advance in electrometallurgy at least for many years, calling it a "practical" furnace yielding alloy up to 20 percent aluminum. The first was begun in 1884 and the best was tested in Cleveland in 1886. Minet gave the real credit though to other chemists who saw how to produce "pure aluminum".[6]
Design of a Cowles furnace
William Frishmuth, who as the sole aluminium supplier in the United States built the Washington Monument's aluminum cap in 1884, was one among those who worried that "foreign capitalists" were about to control the world aluminium market.[7]
Charles Martin Hall was a graduate of Oberlin College in Ohio who had discovered in February 1886 an electrolytic process for aluminum extraction. His patent application in July collided with Paul Héroult's application for the same idea, "electrolysis of alumina in cryolite" and for which Héroult had received the patent in France in April. Hall proved his February date and was awarded the patent in the U.S.[3] Hall made a licensing agreement and worked with the Cowles at the facility in Lockport with the hopes of moving his ideas from the laboratory into production.
Cowles did not choose to use the Hall patent.[8] Their reason is unclear—some in Lockport remember it as disagreement about "external heat and copper electrodes" and "internally heated furnace and carbon electrodes",[9] and Alcoa culture remembers it as an attempt to "suppress his new process by buying him out".[10] Hall left after one year, in July 1888, to found the Pittsburgh Reduction Company which today is named Alcoa.[8]
Later years
In 1891 after Cowles began to advertise "pure aluminum" they were sued by the Pittsburgh Reduction Company. The judge announced his decision in January 1893, finding them to be infringing the patent of Hall and having gained knowledge of his process by hiring away a chemist named Hobbs who was the foreman in Pittsburgh.[8][11] In 1903 the Cowles won a countersuit.[citation needed] The surviving brother Alfred chose to stop work on aluminum and Cowles received royalties and a US$1.35 million payment in settlement. The appeal said the patent application of Charles S. Bradley which Cowles had acquired in 1885 and Alcoa had acquired from Cowles in 1904[citation needed] hinted at an internally rather than externally heated furnace.[12][13]
The Cowles facility in England became part of British Aluminium in the late 1880s.[citation needed] In 1893, after Eugene's death, Maybery questioned a presentation that to him indicated the Cowles patents were infringed by the carborundum process of Edward Acheson (Acheson process). In 1900 Cowles received a $300,000 payment from the carborundum company.[12] The judges' decision gave "priority broadly to the Messrs. Cowles for reducing ores and other substances by the incandescent method".[14]
Influence
The achievements of Hall in the U.S. and of Héroult in Europe, and their influence on aluminum companies, some through Héroult's Société Electrometallurgique Française, have been called one of the greatest events in metallurgy.[5] Over ten years, aluminum output in the U.S. increased by 100,000 times and its price dropped to about 2% of its cost before their discovery.[15][16] Cowles engineered a separate venture and did not share that glory, but sometimes the brothers are credited with envisioning and promoting what was the beginning of electrical smelting on a large scale.[5]
Notes
^Donald Holmes Wallace (1977) [1937]. Market Control in the Aluminum Industry. p. 6. ISBN0-405-09786-7. Retrieved 2007-10-27.
^US patent 324658, Eugene H. Cowles and Alfred H. Cowles, "Electric process of smelting ore for the production of alloys, bronzes, and metallic compounds", issued 1885-08-18 and US patent 324659, Eugene H. Cowles, Charles F. Mabery and Alfred H. Cowles, "Process of electric smelting for obtaining aluminium", issued 1885-08-18 and US patent 464933, Charles S. Bradley, "Process of Obtaining Metals From Their Ores or Compounds by Electrolysis, acquired by Cowles", issued 1891-12-08
^ abOverview courtesy Meiers, Peter. "Manufacture of Aluminum". Retrieved 2007-10-25.
^American Association for the Advancement of Science (1886). "Proceedings, Thirty-Fourth Meeting, Held at Ann Arbor, Mich. (1885)". 34. Retrieved 2007-10-28. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
^ abcLeonard Waldo (translator, additions) in Minet, Adolphe (1905). Aluminum in the United States, in The Production of Aluminum and Its Industrial Use. New York, London: John Wiley and Sons, Chapman & Hall, via Internet Archive scan of University of Wisconsin - Madison copy. pp. 241–256. Retrieved 2007-10-28. {{cite book}}: |author= has generic name (help)CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
^Minet, Adolphe (1905). The Production of Aluminum and Its Industrial Use. Leonard Waldo (translator, additions). New York, London: John Wiley and Sons, Chapman & Hall, via Internet Archive scan of University of Wisconsin - Madison copy. pp. 1+22–27+65+79+116 (Héroult speaking)+149. Retrieved 2007-10-28.
^Binczewski quotes Frishmuth from a 25 November 1884 article in The New York Times. Binczewski, George J. (1995). "The Point of a Monument: A History of the Aluminum Cap of the Washington Monument". JOM. The Minerals, Metals & Materials Society via tms.org. 47 (11): 20–25. Bibcode:1995JOM....47k..20B. doi:10.1007/bf03221302. S2CID 111724924. Retrieved 2007-10-27.
^ abc. Oberlin College Archives. 1 November 1994. Archived from the original on 2007-10-16. Retrieved 2007-10-28.
^Journal of the Electrochemical Society U.S. (1948) 105 (7) via a single Google Books snippet, "Hall, who, after 1889, gave up external heating of graphite-lined iron pots and used the current alone to keep the bath fused", and Rooney, Bob (ed.). "Lockport's Points Of Pride". Lockport-NY.com. Retrieved 2007-10-28.
^Ackerman, Laurence D. (1 March 2000). Identity Is Destiny: Leadership and the Roots of Value Creation. San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler Publishers, via Amazon Online Reader Search Inside. pp. 24. ISBN1-57675-068-X. Retrieved 2007-10-28.
^"Against the Cowles Company.; Decision in the Aluminium Patent Infringement Case (article preview)". The New York Times. 15 January 1893. Retrieved 2007-10-28.
^ abSackett, William Edgar, John James Scannell and Mary Eleanor Watson (1917–1918). New Jersey's First Citizens. New Jersey: J.J. Scannell via Internet Archive scan of New York Public Library copy. pp. 103–105. Retrieved 2007-10-25.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
^McMillan, Walter George (1891). A Treatise on Electro-Metallurgy. London, Philadelphia: Charles Griffin and Company, J.B. Lippincott Company, via Internet Archive scan of New York Public Library copy. pp. 302–305. Retrieved 2007-10-26.
^Mabery, Charles F. (1900). "Notes, On Carborundum". Journal of the American Chemical Society. XXII (Part II): 706–707. doi:10.1021/ja02048a014. Retrieved 2007-10-28.
^Minet, Adolphe (1905). Appendixes C and D, The Production of Aluminum and Its Industrial Use. Leonard Waldo (translator, additions). New York, London. pp. 253–254. Retrieved 2007-10-28.
^(PDF). United States Department of Energy. 2004. pp. 8+12. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2006-09-28. Retrieved 2007-10-27.
. The Manufacturer and Builder. New York: Western and Company, via Cornell University Library. 18 (1): 13. January 1886. Archived from the original on 2008-08-06. Retrieved 2007-10-27.
"pintu aluminium". The Manufacturer and Builder. Jakarta: Alumunium depok, via blog info aluminium. Retrieved 2021-08-12.
"kusen aluminium". The Manufacturer and Builder. jakarta: alumunium depok, via web info. Retrieved 2021-08-12.
"aluminium". The Manufacturer and Builder. jakarta: alumunium depok, via blog info. Retrieved 2021-08-12.
External links
"Photo of the company courtesy Lockport Secondary Sights". Lockport-NY.com. Retrieved 2007-10-27.
January 07, 2023
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The Electric Smelting and Aluminum Company founded as Cowles Electric Smelting and Aluminum Company and Cowles Syndicate Company Limited formed in the United States and England during the mid 1880s to extract and supply valuable metals Founded by two brothers from Ohio the Cowles companies are remembered for producing alloys in quantity sufficient for commerce Their furnaces were electric arc smelters one of the first viable methods for extracting metals Electric Smelting and Aluminum CompanyTypePrivateIndustryAluminum bronze carborundum copper alloysFoundedc 1886 to 1940sFounderAlfred H Cowles Eugene H CowlesHeadquarters555 Jackson Street Lockport New York United States before 1895 the Cowles Electric Smelting and Aluminum CompanyCowles Syndicate Company Limited Staffordshire EnglandThe businesses of the era dramatically increased the supply of aluminium a plentiful resource not found in nature in pure form and reduced its price The Cowles process was the immediate predecessor to the Hall Heroult process today in nearly universal use more than a century after it was discovered by Charles Martin Hall and Paul Heroult and adapted by others including Carl Josef Bayer Because of the patent landscape the Cowles companies found themselves in court Judges eventually acknowledged their innovations many years after the companies formed and one brother received two separate settlements 1 Contents 1 Early years 2 Later years 3 Influence 4 Notes 5 Further reading 6 External linksEarly years Edit Cowles in Stoke on Trent Eugene H Cowles and Alfred H Cowles sons of newspaper publisher Edwin Cowles of Cleveland Ohio built high temperature furnaces during the late 1880s in Lockport New York and in Stoke upon Trent in England based on the furnace of Carl Wilhelm Siemens Charles F Mabery at the time of what is today the Case School of Engineering contributed expertise in chemistry 2 3 The family had purchased a copper zinc mine on the Pecos River in New Mexico in 1883 Eugene that year designed a furnace to extract zinc from the mine s ores Two young employees were testing four furnaces in a Cleveland laboratory by 1885 4 Their first plant was built to extract aluminium in 1886 using hydropower from a tailrace of Niagara Falls on the Niagara River 5 Adolphe Minet wrote a sympathetic assessment twenty years later in 1905 from the perspective of Paris The Cowles furnace was electrochemical one of two kinds of processes applied to producing aluminum during the 19th century and belonged to the electrothermic group that includes Heroult alloys Brin Bessemer Stephanite and Moissan carbide Minet thought Cowles was the first great advance in electrometallurgy at least for many years calling it a practical furnace yielding alloy up to 20 percent aluminum The first was begun in 1884 and the best was tested in Cleveland in 1886 Minet gave the real credit though to other chemists who saw how to produce pure aluminum 6 Design of a Cowles furnace William Frishmuth who as the sole aluminium supplier in the United States built the Washington Monument s aluminum cap in 1884 was one among those who worried that foreign capitalists were about to control the world aluminium market 7 Charles Martin Hall was a graduate of Oberlin College in Ohio who had discovered in February 1886 an electrolytic process for aluminum extraction His patent application in July collided with Paul Heroult s application for the same idea electrolysis of alumina in cryolite and for which Heroult had received the patent in France in April Hall proved his February date and was awarded the patent in the U S 3 Hall made a licensing agreement and worked with the Cowles at the facility in Lockport with the hopes of moving his ideas from the laboratory into production Cowles did not choose to use the Hall patent 8 Their reason is unclear some in Lockport remember it as disagreement about external heat and copper electrodes and internally heated furnace and carbon electrodes 9 and Alcoa culture remembers it as an attempt to suppress his new process by buying him out 10 Hall left after one year in July 1888 to found the Pittsburgh Reduction Company which today is named Alcoa 8 Later years EditIn 1891 after Cowles began to advertise pure aluminum they were sued by the Pittsburgh Reduction Company The judge announced his decision in January 1893 finding them to be infringing the patent of Hall and having gained knowledge of his process by hiring away a chemist named Hobbs who was the foreman in Pittsburgh 8 11 In 1903 the Cowles won a countersuit citation needed The surviving brother Alfred chose to stop work on aluminum and Cowles received royalties and a US 1 35 million payment in settlement The appeal said the patent application of Charles S Bradley which Cowles had acquired in 1885 and Alcoa had acquired from Cowles in 1904 citation needed hinted at an internally rather than externally heated furnace 12 13 The Cowles facility in England became part of British Aluminium in the late 1880s citation needed In 1893 after Eugene s death Maybery questioned a presentation that to him indicated the Cowles patents were infringed by the carborundum process of Edward Acheson Acheson process In 1900 Cowles received a 300 000 payment from the carborundum company 12 The judges decision gave priority broadly to the Messrs Cowles for reducing ores and other substances by the incandescent method 14 Influence EditThe achievements of Hall in the U S and of Heroult in Europe and their influence on aluminum companies some through Heroult s Societe Electrometallurgique Francaise have been called one of the greatest events in metallurgy 5 Over ten years aluminum output in the U S increased by 100 000 times and its price dropped to about 2 of its cost before their discovery 15 16 Cowles engineered a separate venture and did not share that glory but sometimes the brothers are credited with envisioning and promoting what was the beginning of electrical smelting on a large scale 5 Notes Edit Donald Holmes Wallace 1977 1937 Market Control in the Aluminum Industry p 6 ISBN 0 405 09786 7 Retrieved 2007 10 27 US patent 324658 Eugene H Cowles and Alfred H Cowles Electric process of smelting ore for the production of alloys bronzes and metallic compounds issued 1885 08 18 and US patent 324659 Eugene H Cowles Charles F Mabery and Alfred H Cowles Process of electric smelting for obtaining aluminium issued 1885 08 18 and US patent 464933 Charles S Bradley Process of Obtaining Metals From Their Ores or Compounds by Electrolysis acquired by Cowles issued 1891 12 08 a b Overview courtesy Meiers Peter Manufacture of Aluminum Retrieved 2007 10 25 American Association for the Advancement of Science 1886 Proceedings Thirty Fourth Meeting Held at Ann Arbor Mich 1885 34 Retrieved 2007 10 28 a href Template Cite journal html title Template Cite journal cite journal a Cite journal requires journal help a b c Leonard Waldo translator additions in Minet Adolphe 1905 Aluminum in the United States in The Production of Aluminum and Its Industrial Use New York London John Wiley and Sons Chapman amp Hall via Internet Archive scan of University of Wisconsin Madison copy pp 241 256 Retrieved 2007 10 28 a href Template Cite book html title Template Cite book cite book a author has generic name help CS1 maint multiple names authors list link Minet Adolphe 1905 The Production of Aluminum and Its Industrial Use Leonard Waldo translator additions New York London John Wiley and Sons Chapman amp Hall via Internet Archive scan of University of Wisconsin Madison copy pp 1 22 27 65 79 116 Heroult speaking 149 Retrieved 2007 10 28 Binczewski quotes Frishmuth from a 25 November 1884 article in The New York Times Binczewski George J 1995 The Point of a Monument A History of the Aluminum Cap of the Washington Monument JOM The Minerals Metals amp Materials Society via tms org 47 11 20 25 Bibcode 1995JOM 47k 20B doi 10 1007 bf03221302 S2CID 111724924 Retrieved 2007 10 27 a b c Charles Martin Hall 1863 1914 Collection 1882 1985 Biography Oberlin College Archives 1 November 1994 Archived from the original on 2007 10 16 Retrieved 2007 10 28 Journal of the Electrochemical Society U S 1948 105 7 via a single Google Books snippet Hall who after 1889 gave up external heating of graphite lined iron pots and used the current alone to keep the bath fused and Rooney Bob ed Lockport s Points Of Pride Lockport NY com Retrieved 2007 10 28 Ackerman Laurence D 1 March 2000 Identity Is Destiny Leadership and the Roots of Value Creation San Francisco Berrett Koehler Publishers via Amazon Online Reader Search Inside pp 24 ISBN 1 57675 068 X Retrieved 2007 10 28 Against the Cowles Company Decision in the Aluminium Patent Infringement Case article preview The New York Times 15 January 1893 Retrieved 2007 10 28 a b Sackett William Edgar John James Scannell and Mary Eleanor Watson 1917 1918 New Jersey s First Citizens New Jersey J J Scannell via Internet Archive scan of New York Public Library copy pp 103 105 Retrieved 2007 10 25 a href Template Cite book html title Template Cite book cite book a CS1 maint multiple names authors list link McMillan Walter George 1891 A Treatise on Electro Metallurgy London Philadelphia Charles Griffin and Company J B Lippincott Company via Internet Archive scan of New York Public Library copy pp 302 305 Retrieved 2007 10 26 Mabery Charles F 1900 Notes On Carborundum Journal of the American Chemical Society XXII Part II 706 707 doi 10 1021 ja02048a014 Retrieved 2007 10 28 Minet Adolphe 1905 Appendixes C and D The Production of Aluminum and Its Industrial Use Leonard Waldo translator additions New York London pp 253 254 Retrieved 2007 10 28 Aluminum Industry of the Future annual report PDF United States Department of Energy 2004 pp 8 12 Archived from the original PDF on 2006 09 28 Retrieved 2007 10 27 Further reading Edit Engineering portal Companies portal Cowles Aluminium Alloys The Manufacturer and Builder New York Western and Company via Cornell University Library 18 1 13 January 1886 Archived from the original on 2008 08 06 Retrieved 2007 10 27 pintu aluminium The Manufacturer and Builder Jakarta Alumunium depok via blog info aluminium Retrieved 2021 08 12 kusen aluminium The Manufacturer and Builder jakarta alumunium depok via web info Retrieved 2021 08 12 aluminium The Manufacturer and Builder jakarta alumunium depok via blog info Retrieved 2021 08 12 External links Edit Photo of the company courtesy Lockport Secondary Sights Lockport NY com Retrieved 2007 10 27 Retrieved from https en wikipedia org w index php title Electric Smelting and Aluminum Company amp oldid 1100017350, wikipedia, wiki, book, books, library,
