Olin news
FINE PAPER AND FILM CTROUP
Vol. XXI, No. 3
THIRD QUARTER 1975
MULTI-PRONGED FLAX IMPROVEMENTS
NOW ASSURE SUPPLIES AND GROWTH
POTENTIAL FOR ECUSTA’S FLAX PAPERS
With the change of time Ecusta has come full circle with its basic raw
material -- flax.
When the guns of aggression were sounding the start of World War II,
farmland alongside the Davidson River was changing to industrial use for
the first sizeable production of flax cigarette paper in this country. It was
made possible by new technology
that opened up uses for an agri
cultural waste, the by-product
of this country's flax grown as
source of linseed oil.
The quantity of raw material
seemed enough for all time. Grown
extensively in the upper midwest
and in California’s Imperial Valley,
the flax crop had its ups and downs
according to weather, but where
one source declined the other was
comforting insurance. The combina
tion of raw material, technology
and machinery was of extreme
importance to the morale of the
United States military and civilian
forces when the war cut off imports
of flax cigarette paper for the to
bacco industries’ cigarette-making
machines. Dependence on European
papers was a thing of the past. The
flax crop was more than adequate
(Continued on page 2)
PISGAH FOREST
PLANTS SET NEW
SAFETY RECORD
All employees at Pisgah Forest
were singled out September 22
as each playing a vital role in
the location’s accumulation of
5,000,000, injury-free worker hours.
Rain forced indoors the program
honoring the Pisgah Forest em
ployees but did not dampen the
enthusiasm of the record high safety
performance for the industrial com
plex. The program was arranged
after both plants had passed the
2,000,000 worker hour mark. The
extra million was passed late Sep
tember 21 on the eve of the program.
By then the Film Division plant had
(Continued on page 26)
Bicentennial colors of the flax
processing plant at Rauville point
up the newness of this new facility
a few miles northeast of Water-
town, South Dakota. Truckloads
of baled flax are unloaded under
the shelter at left where the bales
begin their conveyor ride into the
plant. Woody cores of the flax
plants are removed by decorti-
cators, leaving the fibrous bark
which is then baled for shipment
by rail at right. The process includes
a drying chamber for adjustment of
moisture content. Offices are in the
front projection and to the rear is an
elaborate dust collection system.
What appear to be barns in the
background are multi-ton stacks
of flax, just as in storage areas
scattered throughout the Dakotas,
Minnesota and southern Canada.