New Canadian Dye.
We have seen it stated in several of our exchanges that Professor Lawson, of Kingston, C. W., has prepared a new dye, of great beauty, from an insect found on the common black spruce. The new dye is said to resemble that of cochineal, which latter is now employed to impart rich red, scarlet and crimson colors to woolen and silk fabrics. If this dye can be sufficient quantities to be afforded at a reasonable price, the discovery will be of importance. Cochineal costs about $1 per pound, wholesale; it is very rich in coloring matter, one ounce being sufficient to color one pound of wool, and two ounces one pound of silk. If the Canadian dye can be afforded as cheap as Indian lac dye, of which we think it must be a variety, it is an important discovery.
-Scientific American 17, 27.4.1861
Juttu alkoi kiinnostamaan siinä määrin, että päätin kaivella hieman verkosta lisää tietoa: oliko tuo väriaine hitti vai huti?
Kirjasta Field's Chromatography (George Field & J. Scott Taylor; Winsor and Newton, 1885) löytyykin kappale 104. Lawson's Red:
In 1861 it was stated that Professor Lawson had prepared a new dye of great richness, in the laboratory of Queen's College, Canada, from an insect, a species of coccus, found the previous summer for the first time on a tree of the common black spruce (Abies nigra), in the neighbourhood of Kingston. Having been but recently observed, a sufficient quantity had not been obtained for a complete series of experiments as to its nature and uses; but the habits of the insect, as well as the properties of the dye, seemed to indicate that it might become aof practical importance. In colour it closely resembled ordinary cochineal, but was rather more scarlet it hue. It was described as capable of being produced in temperate countries. The colouring matter had not been thrown upon a base, nor do we know that it has since been introduced as a pigment. If it possesses greater stability than cochineal, with equal brilliancy and depth, this dye might form one of those colour of the future, to whose possible sources we would direct attention.
Kohtuullisen kattava tietolähde, The Pigment Compendium Dictionary (Nicholas Eastaugh & Tracey Chaplin & Ruth Siddall; Butterworth-Heinemann, 2004) käytännössä luettelee lyhennellen saman tekstin kuin yllämainatussa lainauksessa on (kirjassa mainitaan tekstin alkuperäislähteeksi Salter 1869; kyseessä lienee ns. Salter's edition Fieldin kirjasta). Toisin sanoen, on oletettavaa, että väriaine ei kuitenkaan tehnyt läpimurtoa, koska siitä ei löydy enempää mainintoja. Onko syy väriaineen tuottamisen hankaluus, väriaineen kelpaamattomuus tarkoitukseensa vai se, että värin löytä osui juuri aikaan, kun keinotekoiset aniliinivärit ottivat vallan markkinoilla ja luonnonvärien tuotanto tyrehtyi kokonaan?
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Verkosta löytyy lisäksi mainintoja siitä, että mustakuusen kävyistä saa oranssinkeltaista väriainetta ja jauhetusta puuaineksesta keltaista väriainetta.
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