In May 1848, Henry Bewley, of the Gutta Percha Company of London, patented a process for making flexible syringes and tubes of gutta percha. He described the process as one that involved “filling a suitable mold with a substance in a granular state,” after which he would “subject these molds to a heat sufficient to liquefy the gutta percha, which on subsequent cooling will be found to retain the exact shape or figure of the molds.” [1] His company went on to make various molded and, later, extruded products, including wire coating for submarine cables. One example of his molding process is a coat of arms, pictured below, that resembled “the choicest carved or gilded oak, rosewood, or mahogany,” but was not fashioned by a skilled artist. Instead, it was manufactured “by merely pressing the ungainly lumps into a mold.” With such a mold, thousands of identical products could be manufactured “without the usual expense of artist work.” [2]