Chemistry's Contribution to the Cottonseed Industry

Abstract

WHEN Harry D. Wilson, Louisiana's venerable Commissioner of Agriculture, was a boy he derived great personal pleasure from the fact that his father's cotton gin was located on a river's bank. This meant that he did not have to spend his Saturdays, as did many boys in the fall, hauling cottonseed to a safe distance from the gin and burning it. He could simply dump the lot into the river and let the current carry it away. Today cottonseed bring to Commissioner Wilson's great host of farmer friends more than $100,000,000 each year. The story of this transformation from waste product to a $200,000,000 industry is principally a story of chemistry. The first problems of utilizing cottonseed were mechanical rather than chemical. During the first half of the 19th century the removal of linters and the separation of the hulls from the kernels engaged the attention of experimenters. It was generally believed that the oil ...