Investors Business Daily:
So the race was on among inventors worldwide to find a process that vulcanized rubber.
In the thick of that competition was Charles Goodyear.
He crossed the finish line first by unlocking the secrets of raw rubber and creating a global industry of rubber products.
Finally came the big discovery in 1839. As he experimented with a mixture of rubber and sulfur, he accidentally dropped the mixture on a hot stove. He collected the mixture and found, surprisingly, that it was not sticky, but dry.
He then heated the mixture to a high temperature, cooled it and found the rubber was not sticky in hot weather or brittle in cold weather. It stayed soft and springy.
Goodyear had discovered vulcanization by adding sulfur to rubber.
Photo by Bill McChesney