Johnny Rubber

In 1734 a French Explorer to the depths of the Amazon Jungle, close to the convergence of the territories of Bolivia, Brazil and Peru was fascinated by a natural product which the native tribes used to great effect to waterproof their forest homes.

It was sourced from plentiful trees in the river basin by cutting into the bark and trunk and tapping the milky white substance. It was naturally springy and malleable, easily transported and generally useful in the everyday lives of the indigenous population. It came to the attention of some entrepreneurs as latex or gum elastic but in a roundabout and haphazard way the Goodyear Brothers, Charles and Nelson in 1839 found that combining it in a heat process with sulphur and lead, which became known as vulcanisation, produced a very durable, heat and cold resistant yet flexible material.

Rubber was invented.

Though Goodyear is often credited with the invention of vulcanised rubber, modern evidence has proven that the Meso-americans used stabilised rubber for balls and other objects as early as 1600 BC and another experimenter Thomas Hancock had a patent pending for a vulcanisation process 8 weeks before Goodyear in 1844.

Goodyear had a fairly limited vision for the new rubber but was keen to show what the wonder material could do and demonstrated its versatility by making jewellery chains, brooches and earrings of some rare beauty. An advanced vulcanisation process made the rubber a deep black colour, Ebonite.

In 1851 at The Great Exhibition in the United Kingdom a Scottish Chemist displayed his new clothing range of rubber in a cloth surround and so the MacKintosh became a must have item in the wardrobes of the well to do in Victorian society.

From fashion to industry rubber proved to be an ideal material even for mundane products. The dominance of steam power saw rubber gaskets play an important role in ensuring an airtight and waterproof seal between pipe runs and made fortunes for their manufacturers.

By 1873 the price of rubber on the world trade markets exceeded that commanded by silver.

In 1887 James Dunlop patented the pneumatic tyre and demand for rubber from the South Americas escalated into a frenzy only before seen in a Gold Rush.

Thousands  were taken by rubber fever and made their way to the Amazon to get a share of the monies to be made. As with many similar exploitations of natural materials to feed consumer demand across the globe there seemed to be no real regulation by Governments and it was a free for all, very much along the imperial trade mantra of "trade by whatever means".

The losers in the frenzy were the native Indians who were mercilessly enslaved by brutal rubber barons or if becoming a nuisance or a burden, just beaten, raped or murdered.

The violence and torture was in part undertaken with the full knowledge and implied consent of many British backed companies marking a shameful episode in their involvement in Bolivia, Brazil and Peru.

The great Amazonian Explorer Colonel Fawcett witnessed or was availed of many atrocities perpetrated in the name of Britain leading to an official enquiry into the moral and ethics of those involved.

There was a huge loss of life also amongst the rubber hunters in the extreme climate of the region and from disease, attack by insects and wild animals including snakes and piranha's and increasingly down to conflict with beleagured tribes forced to fight to protect their territory and livelihoods.

The rubber boom could not be sustained as the supply was critically affected by the reckless tapping of trees without thought of replanting for future years.

In hindsight the peak years in South America were over by 1914.

Fawcett had noticed in his many expeditions in the Amazon that huge swaths of the natural habitat had been destroyed, a practice continued relentlessly to the present day under the same global trade justification.