Henry Evans Griffith
Monsanto Chemical Corporation
Inducted 1993
Henry Griffith (1914 – 1989) helped create the plastics container and packaging industry through a unique combination of technical and marketing skills. His professional career was devoted to developing and commercializing basic innovations in rigid plastics for packaging.
Griffith was born in Kansas City, MO, and graduated from Princeton University in 1937 with a B.S. in chemical engineering. He began his 50-year career in the plastics industry at the Monsanto Chemical Corporation, where he worked as a development engineer from 1937-1941, then at Plax Corporation from 1941-1949. Griffith played a major role in developing, producing, and marketing polystyrene and polyethylene bottles from the newly invented blow molding process. He then co-founded the Bradley Container Corporation in 1949, becoming president until his departure in 1958. While at Bradley, he developed the process for manufacturing squeezable plastic tubes from polyolefins, which remain widely used today. He also founded the Plastic Tube & Bottle Corporation in 1958. In 1974, he formed PPA, Inc., a consulting company to help support both U.S. and European packaging businesses. He remained active as a consultant until he died in 1989.
In 1985, Henry Griffith received the John Wesley Hyatt Award from the Society of Plastics Engineers (SPE). He was an active member of many technical organizations, including the Plastics Pioneers Association, The Society of the Plastics Industry (SPI, now PLASTICS), SPE, the American Chemical Society (ACS), the Packaging Institute, and the American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AICHE).
Areas of Expertise:
Plastic processing, Plastics packaging