Who invented vulcanized rubber?

Charles Goodyear was a man with comprehensive knowledge of chemistry who literally saved the American rubber industry in the middle 1930s. The material which had been used before his invention of vulcanized rubber was unstable, cracking in winter and melting in summer. Charles was really stubborn - he became determined to invent a way to make the new substance more stable and funneled all his energies into this job. Charles went through numerous failures, poverty and jail.

He was derided and considered mad, but remained undeterred. And one day Charles was finally hailed as a genius! After all the hard work he found that, by uniformly heating sulfur- and lead-fortified rubber at a relatively low temperature, he could render the rubber melt-proof and reliable. His invention was patented in 1944. Well-known Goodyear tires were later named after this great inventor, as he was the one who made this product possible.