Article, Gunpowder Manufacture in 1861

[AccelR8]

I was searching the net for "where are gunpowders manufactured" trying to find what country certain powders are made in (wondering if this has or will have any effect on availability). In doing so I ran across this NYT article from August 10, 1861 that provided some interesting historical information on powder manufacturing.

GUNPOWDER AND ITS MANUFACTURE.; Where and How it is Made The Materials Where Found A New Discovery in Cannon Powder. (Published 1861)

www.nytimes.com

 

[XTR]

Now take a moment to research the Gunpowder works in Augusta, Ga. The one wartime resource for which the CSA never wanted was powder. The follow on is that it is likely that the works was dissembled because DuPont didn't want the competition.

 

[jdh47]

Somewhere around 1962 or so our high school chemistry teacher made the mistake of teaching us how to make black powder. My best friend and I made a lot of it. We'd put it in empty cardboard hand towel tubes acquired from the restroom and cork the ends and taped with athletic tape leaving one end a little loose so it would blow off. The scenario was to make rockets which we taped to a roller skate and pointed towards the jr. high building on the sidewalk. They never reached their destination because the damned thing wouldn't run true so we soon tired of that. When taped really tight and packed well it makes an exquisite bomb. Who knew it would cause so much excitement? From then on our spare time was well accounted for and we were confined to study hall.

 

[FNSafari]

We made small firecrackers from cap gun caps. Tore the paper around the flash powder off as best we could, packed them into rolled up baseball cards taped and used a small length of fuse. Huge boom!!

 

[Just Say Moe]

boys + time = trouble

I say this based on personal experience!

 

[matthias]

That is a fun to read article. Thanks for posting