The physics of high polymers.…a survey and forecast

Many of the great physicists of the 19th Century were more familiar with today's problems of high‐polymer physics than were those of the early 20th Century. Maxwell, Boltzmann, Joule, and others were interested in many problems in this field. Most of these problems were later forgotten or ignored in favor of the more exciting, fashionable, and important problems of x‐rays, quantum theory, wave mechanics, and atomic structure, which have almost monopolized the attention of modern physicists.