Kilmer House

Alert Kilmer House readers may have noticed that there are a number of photographs of Johnson & Johnson from the early 1890s on the blog, like this one: 1893 photograph of Johnson & Johnson buildings in New Brunswick, N.J. Today, with digital cameras and mobile phones, it’s second nature to take a picture of anything at any time.  But in 1893 it was still a big deal, and we have some evidence that the photo shoot that resulted in these pictures was a big event at Johnson & Johnson. The oldest images we have of Johnson & Johnson from the late 1880s are illustrat

There’s nothing worse than losing the instructions for something you’ve bought, especially if it’s something you need to use in an emergency. Some people keep all of their instruction manuals in an envelope or a folder, or in an electronic file, which is fine...as long as they remember where they put the file. But there is a better way, and it was discovered by the creator of a famous product that became part of our product lines over 100 years ago. Now where did I put the instruction booklet? The product was the Esmarch Triangular Bandage, a very well known wound treatment and First Aid prod

Designer BAND-AID® Brand Adhesive Bandages.  In a tin! With the success of Cynthia Rowley-designed BAND-AID® Brand Adhesive Bandages in special limited edition tins, it has become overwhelmingly clear that adults like wearing consumer wound care products with designs on them as much as kids do.  But there never has been a grown-up version of the colorful BAND-AID® Brand Adhesive Bandages until now…or has there? The Cynthia Rowley designer BAND-AID® Brand Adhesive Bandages unwrapped For a number of years, our consumer products operating company has made BAND-AID® Brand Adhesive Band

When Johnson & Johnson founders Robert Wood Johnson, James Wood Johnson and Edward Mead Johnson were born in the mid-1800s, one of the most basic developments in science and medicine that we take for granted today -- an understanding of the causes of infection – hadn’t been discovered.  During the Johnson brothers’ early years, that scientific discovery and its practical application to surgery would completely transform medicine.  In 1886 (125 years ago!), those brothers, now grown up, built on that discovery and its application.  How?  They started a business to make the first mass produc

High school students taking over Johnson & Johnson for a day?  A seventeen-year old Chairman and CEO sitting at General Robert Wood Johnson’s desk?  What on earth was going on at Johnson & Johnson in the late 1940s and the 1950s?  It was all part of a program called A Day in Modern Industry…an early cousin to today’s Take Our Daughters and Sons to Work events. High School students at Johnson & Johnson for the A Day in Modern Industry Program Johnson & Johnson started the A Day in Modern Industry program in 1947 and, like the invention of BAND-AID® Brand Adhesive Bandages, it wa

Sometimes a chance conversation can lead to unexpected things.  In Johnson & Johnson history, conversations have led to some very well-known products from our Family of Companies.  A conversation in the late 1800s between one of our founders and someone he met on vacation led to something that’s a part of modern life:  The First Aid Kit.  Here’s how it happened. Vintage 1930s First Aid Kit, from our archives One day in the late 1880s, Company founder Robert Wood Johnson was on a Denver & Rio Grande train heading west through the Rocky Mountains, on his way to a much anticipated vacatio

Surgery before it was sterile, with the surgeons in street clothing, and a complete lack of aseptic procedures. Although it seems hard to believe today, as recently as the late 1800s the concept that surgery should be sterile was still facing an uphill battle.  Some people found it hard to believe that invisible “germs” (as they were called) were causing the high rates of post-surgical infections.  Others (some surgeons included) still believed that infections weren’t caused by germs at all, which inclined them to view sterile surgery as an unnecessary affectation.  Surgeons who did want to tr

Sir Joseph Lister, from our archives This February marks the 100th anniversary of the passing of Sir Joseph Lister.  The father of modern antiseptic surgery, he was also the inspiration behind the founding of Johnson & Johnson.  It was Lister’s lecture at the 1876 Philadelphia Centennial Exhibition that led medicinal plaster maker Robert Wood Johnson and his brothers to start a company to make the first mass produced sterile surgical dressings and sterile sutures and actively promote the adoption of sterile surgery.  Today, non-sterile surgery would be unthinkable, but it wasn’t all that l

There's a popular saying that you can't put toothpaste back into a tube. But you CAN come up with the idea to put toothpaste into a tube, and do you know who was one of the first companies to do that? If you answered Johnson & Johnson, you would be correct! That toothpaste was Zonweiss, our first consumer product. Johnson & Johnson made it available for sale in collapsible metal tubes in 1889 - three and seven years before the oldest commonly accepted claims of 1892 and 1896 for that innovation. Here's the story. Zonweiss ad, 1886, from our archives The first ads for Zonweiss appeared

As readers of Kilmer House -- and The Duct Tape Guys’ popular website – know, duct tape was invented by a Johnson & Johnson operating company in response to a request from the U.S. military for a cloth-based, waterproof tape during World War II.  But have you ever wondered why the Army made that request, and who had the original idea for duct tape?  Well, wonder no more, thanks to Kilmer House reader Kari Santo, whose great grandmother Vesta Stoudt had the idea that led to duct tape. Meet Vesta Stoudt, whose idea led to duct tape! Photo from The Chicago Sunday Tribune, October 24th 1943 In