Merchant Archive
Thread: Book of Dingo 2:41 Exorcism of the Exploiter
LadyGrey wrote:I got one-starred? For giving DocSavag a compliment? DocSavag has several qualities that are lacking in most correspondents in these forums, the most prominent being that he has a sense of humor. Then again, a sense of humor is perhaps one of the first fatalities of a lot of the merchants that come to this forum.However, I do admit that sometimes I think that I am much funnier than what anyone else thinks I am. So I will accept my one-star with true humility, and stop trying to be funny for a few days.
Without a sense of humor in this position you would go insane in a week.
With a sense of humor it takes three weeks at least!
Few people who use the phrase today realise that there’s a story of human suffering behind it; the term actually derives from an early industrial occupational disease. Felt hats were once very popular in North America and Europe; an example is the top hat. The best sorts were made from beaver fur, but cheaper ones used furs such as rabbit instead.
A complicated set of processes was needed to turn the fur into a finished hat. With the cheaper sorts of fur, an early step was to brush a solution of a mercury compound—usually mercurous nitrate—on to the fur to roughen the fibres and make them mat more easily, a process called carroting because it made the fur turn orange. Beaver fur had natural serrated edges that made this unnecessary, one reason why it was preferred, but the cost and scarcity of beaver meant that other furs had to be used.
Whatever the source of the fur, the fibres were then shaved off the skin and turned into felt; this was later immersed in a boiling acid solution to thicken and harden it. Finishing processes included steaming the hat to shape and ironing it. In all these steps, hatters working in poorly ventilated workshops would breathe in the mercury compounds and accumulate the metal in their bodies.
We now know that mercury is a cumulative poison that causes kidney and brain damage. Physical symptoms include trembling (known at the time as hatter’s shakes), loosening of teeth, loss of co-ordination, and slurred speech; mental ones include irritability, loss of memory, depression, anxiety, and other personality changes. This was called mad hatter syndrome.
It’s been a very long time since mercury was used in making hats, and now all that remains is a relic phrase that links to a nasty period in manufacturing history. But mad hatter syndrome remains common as a description of the symptoms of mercury poisoning.
DingoBoi wrote:oh great ... our correspondent is as mad as a hatter!
And that comes as a surprise to you??
