The unique product in which Martinsville leads the world was celebrated Sunday during the Martinsville-Henry County Historical Society’s Founders Day program.
Film production in Martinsville was started in 1956 by Julius Hermes, who originally was onto another goal: carpet fibers.
Hermes’ granddaughter Tracy Tate talked about how he started the company.
Hermes and Burness Frith opened Martin Processing in Collinsville. The company specialized in dying technology for polyester yarn and other materials. In all, Hermes was granted 17 patents for his inventions.
But, according to Tate, the true value of the business was the people involved.
“Papa Jule truly valued and appreciated all of his employees,” Tate said. “He knew that there would never have been a success of Martin Processing in its three divisions had it not been for his employees behind him.”
In the 1970s, she said, Hermes “had the smarts and the brains to open a manufacturing division” to get the machinery made to manufacture the yarn and film, and he also opened a textile division.
That machinery division, where Tate has worked, now is Smart Machines, and the textile division still runs in Rocky Mount as Ronile, she said. Martin Processing is now Eastman Performance Films.
She read a quote from the website of Llumar, the window film manufactured by Eastman Chemical Company: “The entrepreneurial initiative of Julius Hermes in 1956 was the historical cornerstone of the LLumar brand. Known as the father of dyed PET (polyethylene terephthalate) — the polyester now used in most window films — he was the right person, with the right product at the right time that moved the industry forward into the thriving business it is today.”
Kristoff Lievens, the site manager for Eastman Performance Films, said that Hermes’ portrait “is still in the hallway of our plant. The legacy continues as we operate today under the name of Eastman.”
Hermes’ business was “once big on carpet dyeing, which was hard hit in the 1970s, so Hermes redirected the company’s energy into plastic film products,” said Bruce Troughton, Eastman product customization and support specialist. The more than 1 million packaged rolls the Martinsville area produces are in things everyone uses, such as cars and cell phones, he said.
Locally, Eastman has 800 employees in five locations that cover a total of 1,051,727 square feet, Troughton said. They are Fieldale Plants 1 & 2, built in 1961; the Patriot Centre plant which opened in 1995; the Axton plant from 1990; and Films Packaging and Performance Films Warehouse, both from 2020 and in the Patriot Centre.
He gave a timeline of the company’s growth:
- In 1956 Martin Processing was founded to dye polyester fibers.
- In 1960 a patent was issued for deep dyed polyester film.
- In 1961 the 30,000-square-foot plant was built in Fieldale.
- In 1987 Martin Processing went from local to international ownership when it was acquired by Courtaulds, which in 1988 bought a plant in California, closed that plant and transferred much of its assets to Martinsville; it acquired Gila River Products in 1989 and closed it in 1992.
- In 1995 Commonwealth Laminating and Coating was founded at the Patriot Centre.
- Solutia bought Courtaulds, including CPFilms, the Fieldale site, in 1999.
- In 2010 the company acquired Novamatrix Products.
- In 2012 Eastman bought Solutia, including the Fieldale site.
- In 2012 Eastman acquired Commonwealth Laminating & Coating at the Patriot Centre site.
- In 2014 Eastman acquired Commonwealth Laminating & Coating.
The company currently “is planning for future growth and expansions,” he said.
Eastman’s 2022 revenue was $10.6 billion, he said, and it has 15,000 employees. The company has four divisions: additives and functional products, advanced materials, chemical intermediates and fibers. Its local plant “is the largest window film manufacturing facility in the world.”
The Films division makes materials for the fields of transportation, building & construction and electronics & medical, he said.
The process of making window film starts with polyester dyeing, in which dyes are infused into a polyester film. Also, aluminum metal is evaporated onto raw films, for better performance and high reflectivity. Then those two are stuck together in laminating, with additional coatings on each side. The type of adhesive depends on whether the film will be used in automotive or architectural applications.
It all goes back to Julius Hermes, who in 1960 patented the deep dyeing process on polyester textile materials, which is what the Performance Films business is based on.
Learn more about the product made in Martinsville on the LLumar Films YouTube channel.
Upcoming events hosted or co-sponsored by the Historical Society include:
- Sunday Afternoon Lecture Series: “18th Century Toys” with Gail Vogler, 3 p.m. Feb. 18, Historic Henry County Courthouse
- Black History Month Concert: “Virgina State University Gospel Chorale,” 4 p.m. Feb. 24, Walker Hall at Patrick & Henry Community College, co-sponsored also by the Fayette Area Historical Initiative and P&HCC’s Fellowship of Christian Athletes
- Sunday Afternoon Lecture Series: “The Blue Ridge Regional Library: Enriching Our Communities for 100 Years” with Margaret Caldwell, 3 p.m. March 17, Historic Henry County Courthouse
The MHC Heritage Center & Museum is open with a docent for guided tours from 1-4 p.m. Tuesdays through Fridays and also most weekdays from 9-5 (call 276-403-5361 to confirm the director will be there). Holly Kozelsky is the executive director. Visit www.mhchistoricalsociety.org for more information.
