Experimental Plots

During the earliest decades of the 20th century, natural rubber was an important commodity used in a variety of products and industrial applications, especially in the U.S., where 71% of the world's rubber was consumed. Rubber trees were grown and latex harvested in South Asia, but Thomas Edison, Henry Ford, and Harvey Firestone worried about the availability and cost of that supply for their businesses amid unpredictable world politics. They combined resources to form the Edison Botanic Research Corporation in 1927, and in 1928 built the laboratory in Fort Myers to seek a domestic source of rubber that could be grown on American soil. Edison's property was transformed into several acres of experimental plots containing many different types of rubber plants, and researchers repeatedly examined rubber quality and quantity throughout the project, testing over 17,000 specimens from dozens of countries. Goldenrod eventually became Edison's plant of choice, and he argued that one of the United States' greatest needs was American-grown rubber.

Fort Myers, Florida · United States