Document 5Mx8EYqX161OX38pbd3RQVJ0

THE CHAMELEON A magazine for employees of The Sherwin-Williams Co. Published at Cleveland Headquarters since January, 1898 601 Canal Hoad, Cleveland, Ohio VOLUME 28, NUMBER 7 Edited by N. M. Collart JULY-AUGUST, 1927 tory year. S August approaches, we find ourselves again contemplating the close of a fiscal year. Every indi cation points to a satisfac The organization was never in better shape. The quality of our products was never better. Our facilities and equip ment are at maximum capacity and efficiency. Our great campaign on SWP vs. Cheap Paint has brought nation-wide response from consumers, dealers, and our own staff. It has proved a master-stroke. Bold in its conception, quick in action, powerful in its message, our campaign has swept all before it. As goes SWP, so goes the line. This leader carries the line with it, so it is vastly more than just a one-track pro gram. It is institutional and stands for every product we make. The campaign spirit has permeated our manufacturing departments, stock-keep ing organization, office' staffs, as well as sales force. It has put pep and go into every store where our products are carried. Merchants and clerks are talk ing our language. Never was it so easy for the trade to make an SWP sale as now. Never was it so hard for the "cheap" paint man to gain the consumer's ear. The three outstanding merchandising successes of the year are SWP, Opex and Rogers, all notable examples of what can be done through specialization hacked bv the institutional "Cover the Earth" forces. Once again we have proved we are not a one-track organization. None of these successes has been built at a sacrifice of other lines. We are more than a paint house, or a varnish house, or a lacquer house, or an insecticide house or a dye, chemical and color house. We are all these, welded into an or ganization big enough to be an outstand ing factor in each but not too big to give each the special attention it deserves. Our growth upward from the $60,000,000 mark will he in proportion to our ability to further these great specialties in our line, and at the same time, to main tain and expand our general lines on the time-proven policy of "the right product for each purpose." This year will go down in history as. one in which we proved that we could master new problems, new markets, and promote specific products to an unusual degree, and still carry on with the full line which has built our institution in years past. .And this has been done, not by destruc tive methods but by planning and con structive effort, building business, and serving the public. Value received lies back of every transaction. Air. Sherwin's simple motto: "What is worth doing is worth doing well." never had greater significance, nor was it ever adhered to so rigidly. And so, we go into the home stretch, confident of another good year, and trained and ready for many more to come. 'This Summer and Fall should see steadv painting activity in all sections. < furs is no longer a "Spring" business. Is yours? 8 THE CHAMELEON, JULY-AUGUST, 1 THE LITHOPONE PLAN / Barytes Ore Crusher This giant crusher creates a din worse than a million coffee grinders as the boys shovel in the reddish barium ore. Here it is crushed preparatory to going into the roasting oven for the first step in transforming the crude ore into barium sulphide. The roasting oven in the picture below consists of two parts. The large cylinder at the rear is motor driven and revolves slowdy so as to keep the load in motion. The load consists of the crushed barium ore mixed in certain proportion with coal, this proportion depending upon the chemical analysis of the batch. The furnace in front throws an intense heat over the tumbling mass back in the cylinder which is maintained for a number of hours. The ore has now changed both in color and in chemical composition. It is now called black ash and the room in the picture below is called the Black Ash Department. The cylinder is stopped so that the heavy doors are at the bottom which you see at the side of the cylinder in the picture. The contents are re moved and taken to the tanks. The Black Ash is now washed with hot water which dissolves out the soluble barium sulphide, one of the two component ingredients which make lithopone. The barium `liquor," as it is called, is filtered and put through a puri fying process that is most exacting because upon its purity depends the whiteness and fastness to light of the finished product, lithopone. J Few people realize the extent to which our business is built u intricate chemical processes. The paint mills grinding their d output are in reality but the final assembling process in the mal of paint. Much has gone before. There are, of course, two types of paint manufacturers. IV. companies purchase pigments, oils and other ingredients and simply formulators and grinders of paint products. Sherv Williams stand pre-eminent in the other class because we go ri back to the original sources and make our pigments, selling la quantities over and above our own requirements to paint mal all over the country. The making of lithopone is a most interesting example both the way in which we go direct to Mother Earth for our 1 material supplies and of the very complicated chemical process required to bring the ore through to the pigment Phil Steyer's b grind into Flat-Tone Washable Wall Paint! From our mines in Magdalena, New Mexico, we obtain an which we process at our smelters in Coffeyville, Kansas, and p duce a grade of zinc sulphide that meets our specifications bet than any material we could buy on the market. This chemical, we make it, is particularly rich in zinc and quite possibly might suit the manufacturer of some other line of chemicals nearly well as the materials generally sold. But our mines produce t ore and our smelters process it in exactly the best manner that \ make the highest quality of lithopone. Meet the Boys Who Run the Lithopone Plant A. Duval, D. McFcrran (one of the old hoys hired by H. J. Main dozen at Coffeyville), J. Sparks, an expert pigment chemist; J. Potter, P. Cattoiiu \f. Pascal, one of our bright young fellows; II. Johnson, K. Thomas, another one of the lads who along with others is a comer; R. Echols. These arc the boys zvho go right dozen into the works and see to it that there is no slackening of effort in maintaining the high standard of quality that means so much to the Sales Department when they are out selling Flat-Tone against stiff com petition. 7 SUP 652272 THE CHAMELEON, JULY-AUGUST, 192/ AT KENSINGTON Years ago painters had fewer materials to work with than they do now. White lead, for example, was used for outside house paint, for inside flat wall paint and for enamel undercoaters. It is commonsense to conclude that no single material can do all jobs equally well. Through patient effort paint engineers have brought about much needed improvements and economies in paint products. SWP (Sherwin-Williams House Paint) shows a tremendous im provement over old lead and oil paint for outside use and S-W Flat-Tone is the specialized paint which is accepted as superior to white lead for interior decorating. There are those who would have us take this wonderful pigment, lithopone, and combine it with zinc and barytes to use for outside painting, but lithopone is a pigment not best suited to outside weather exposure even when strengthened with zinc. Even our perfected lithopone which is fast to light and not subject to dark ening characteristic of inferior lithopone is recommended by us exclusively for such interior paints as Flat Wall Paint, Save-lite Mill Whites, and enamel underwaters, because lead and zinc paints make better outside paints. The making of lithopone is a highly technical operation, but we shall try to outline the process simply and briefly so that Chameleon readers may have a better appreciation of Flat-Tone, Flat-Rite Enamel Underwater and products made upon a base of SherwinWilliams Lithopone. 9 Zinc Liquor Tubs There are several batteries of wooden vats such as you see in this picture. Through one series is passing the purified barium liquor already described. Through an other series is a liquor made from the zinc sulfate pre pared down in Coffeyville, Kansas, from zinc ore taken from our mines in Magdalena, New Mexico. This liquor, too, has gone through a painstaking process of purification and is run into wooden vats to prevent contamination. These two liquors meet and a chemical reaction takes place which results in the settling out of a white powder which is gathered and placed as a paste in huge furnaces. There it is calcined, or roasted for many hours. When the process is completed the material is withdrawn in cake form and this caked pigment is broken up and fed into the hopper where it is crushed and ground for its final ``ordeal" in the high heat "mufflers" you see in the picture below. When you go through the plant you are shown samples of lithopone after the first roasting to compare with the final product and even untrained eyes can detect the great purity of color and intensity of white in the finished product. Down in the "Liquor room" there were a number of tests we witnessed to show how every gallon of the liquor is watched so that no contamination of any kind, can slip by which would result in an off shade of lithopone when the product is finished. Grinding Lithopone has its beginning back in the mines zvltere zinc ore and where barium ores arc found deep in the earth. Every step from the grading of the ore through the roasting, treating, purifying and formula control calls for the most careful watching and guarding against the many, many things which could go wrong. In the final grinding the lithopone is ground to the most impalpable state of fineness. No particle of lithopone can escape and get into the finished product until it is so fine that it FLOATS OUT over the top. All coarse particles fall back into the grinder. 7 SUP 052