Finding Aids

E.I. du Pont de Nemours & Company is a chemical company more commonly referred to as the DuPont Company. The company was established in 1802 by Pierre Samuel du Pont de Nemours (1739-1817) and his son Éleuthère Irénée du Pont (1771-1834); the company began with the production of gunpowder. In 1919, the DuPont Company created a room dedicated to large charts showing important financial statistics for its explosives business and emerging chemical ventures. The Chart Room was located on the ninth floor of the DuPont Building in Wilmington, nearby the offices of Executive Committee members. This collection consists of four photographs, three of which are panoramic and mounted on cardboard. They consist of three undated views of the DuPont Company Chart Room, taken approximately between 1919 and 1930.

E.I. du Pont de Nemours & Company was established as a black powder manufactory in 1802. The DuPont Company purchased a site near City Point, Virginia on the James River in 1912 in order to build a dynamite plant located closer to the southern market. The onset of World War I, however, created a great demand for guncotton, and the Hopewell Works was converted to that purpose, starting in 1915. This item is a 1916 panoramic photograph of the repair shop.

The Louviers dynamite works began production in 1908 and provided explosives primarily for mines in the region. The panoramic photograph shows a view of the DuPont Company dynamite works at Louviers, Colorado, including the magazine area, powder line, and overall view.

The DuPont Company acquired a site on the York River in Virginia on which they planned to build a dynamite plant. The U.S. Government took over the property in 1918 and got the DuPont Company to build a shell loading plant instead. These three panoramic photographs show overall views of the shell loading plant at Penniman, Virginia during World War I.

In 1902 the DuPont Company acquired the Smith Electric Fuze Company and some other properties in the Pompton Lakes, New Jersey area. DuPont continued the manufacture of fuses, blasting caps, and other blasting supplies at the plant, adding a shell plant and other facilities. One panoramic photograph shows an overview of the DuPont Company plant at Pompton Lakes, New Jersey, 1918, and the other is a group portrait of staff, August 25, 1943.

In 1918, the company opened an additional plant in Racine, Wisconsin to increase the production of smokeless powder to meet the growing demand in order to support the war effort. This panoramic photograph shows a group of engineers outside of the plant.

The DuPont Company purchased a site near City Point, Virginia on the James River in 1912 in order to build a dynamite plant located closer to the southern market. The panoramic photographs show exteriors of the plant, views of the workers' housing, the town (including the African American section), and a photograph of the Hopewell China Corporation, a post-war reuse of one of the facilities.

In 1902, DuPont took control of Laflin & Rand, including the Haskell Works. Infallible and Ballistite powders were manufactured there. The works played an important role in smokeless powder production during World War I. The panoramic photographs depict views of the Du Pont Company's smokeless powder works in Haskell, New Jersey and the workers village nearby.

E.I. du Pont de Nemours & Company Repauno Works manufactured high explosive dynamite. The company began as the Repauno Chemical Company on June 7, 1880, by Lammot du Pont (1831-1884), a chemist working for the family business, E.I. du Pont de Nemours & Company, a chemical company which originally produced gunpowder. The panoramic photographs show two views of the dynamite works and workers village at the DuPont Company's Repauno Works.

The Indiana Ordnance Works was built by the DuPont Company for the U.S. Government beginning in 1940. It manufactured military explosives, propellants, and smokeless powder. The panoramic photographs show overviews of the Indiana Ordnance Works facilities, Charlestown, Indiana.

During World War II, the DuPont Company was contracted to produce smokeless powder, TNT and DNT explosives for the military. This panoramic photograph is a group portrait of uniformed guards at a military explosives plant in Memphis, Tennessee, 1941.

The Allentown Non-Freezing Powder Co. built this plant in 1903 to manufacture commercial explosives using its proprietary ingredient, nitrostarch. The panoramic photograph shows employees of the Trojan Chemical Company explosives plant in Seiple, Pennsylvania.

After the U.S. Congress declared war on April 6, 1917, agents of the U.S. government discussed the need for new gunpowder plants with E. I. du Pont de Nemours and Company, a chemical company more commonly known as the DuPont Company. The DuPont Engineering Company was contracted to survey and do preliminary design for an explosives plant on the Kanawha River sixteen miles west of Charleston, West Virginia. This was to be one of three new government plants and was called Explosives Plant "C." This small collection consists of three panoramic photographs of the U.S. Government Explosives Plant "C" in Nitro, West Virginia, taken after the end of World War I.