In 1890, in a small town in Pennsylvania, Edward Goodrich Acheson, a former aide to Thomas Edison, tried to make diamonds by heating carbon strongly. The experiment failed, but when Acheson added clay to the carbon and fused it electrically, he produced silicon carbide, a substance that contained bright spots enough to scratch glass and cut diamonds. Silicon carbide is also known as emery. The following year, Acheson set up a Pennsylvania company called
[u]carborundum[/u] with money raised by local investors. George Westinghouse was the company's first major customer, and Andrew Mellon, another wealthy capitalist, funded the move of emery to Niagara Falls, where there is cheap and abundant hydropower.
Emery opened at Niagara Falls in 1895 with 35 employees. The new power supply enables it to produce more silicon carbide and use it in abrasives and refractories. Silicon dioxide produced by emery is very important for the development of railway, automobile and aviation industries. Wartime greatly promoted sales, and the company grew rapidly. By 1944, it had more than 6000 employees. At the end of World War II, about 20% of the Niagara Falls workforce worked in emery. In order to adapt to the future growth after the war, emery developed new products, such as ceramic fiber and sponge zirconium metal, which were divided into different business sectors, diversified and internationalized through acquisition. At the end of the 1950s, emery had 30 factories in 10 countries with annual sales of more than $100 million.
In the mid-1970s, sales reached $713 million. Then there was a period of change that lasted about 20 years. During this period, Emery and its division were traded by companies including Kennecott, standard oil, British Petroleum and Saint Gobain, the current parent company of carbonundum. The name of emery was even briefly removed in the 1980s. In 1983, the company's Niagara Falls bonded abrasives plant was closed and sold. Saint Gobain bought emery from BP in 1995. Emery remains a subsidiary of Saint Gobain and the best-selling product of abrasive products. Interested in emery, please contact
[u]china abrasive manufacturer[/u] for details. We can supply all kinds of abrasives except emery.
