Judson Dunaway

S. Judson Dunaway, 1890-1976, was an inventor, entrepreneur, and to the community of Dover, New Hampshire, a philanthropist.

Judson's family appears to be from Virginia: He wrote a chapter on the Dunaway coat of arms in the book "The Dunaways of Virginia", by Anna Elizabeth Clendening.

Dunaway manufactured a number of household specialty chemicals, including Delete rust and stain remover, Vanish toilet bowl cleaner, Elf drain cleaner, Expello moth crystals and insecticide, and Bug-a-Boo moth crystals and aerosol.

Expello was the leading brand in moth crystals. However, because the market is much bigger for toilet bowl cleaners, Vanish was his greatest success. His skills as an inventor were much less important than his skills as a marketer. The world of household cleansers is rife with me-too products.

Moth crystals aren't a complicated product, either; they're just paradichlorobenzene, possibly with perfume added. Moth crystals have largely been displaced by moth balls, which are made of naphthalene, for liability reasons: while naphthalene is highly toxic, paradiclorobenzene is more toxic still. Furthermore, the entire moth preventative product category has declined with the adoption of synthetic fibers, which moths do not eat, and the adoption of air conditioning, which makes it harder for moths to reproduce.

Elf, a me-too drain cleanser, consisted of lye crystals. This was a less effective agent than crystal Drano, which added aluminum shards to generate heat and provide a sharp edge to cut through hair, but it was equally good as any of Drano's other me-too competitors. Delete rust and stain remover consisted of oxalic acid (an anti-rust agent), citric acid (a chelating agent) and microcrystalline cellulose, a very soft abrasive. It was a good product, but not an inspired one, and it addressed a very small niche in the marketplace.

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