Cinchona in the year 1851. Mr. [Thaddäus] Haenke mentioned the existence of cinchona bark on his visit to Yuracares in 1796". (Source: Exploration of the Valley of the Amazon, by Lieut. Lardner Gibbon, USN. Vol.II, Ch.6, pp. 146-47.) The cultivation of cinchona led from the 1890s to a decline in the price of quinine but the quality and production of raw bark by the Dutch in Indonesia led them to dominate world markets. The producers of processed drugs in Europe (especially Germany) however bargained and caused fluctuations in prices which led to a Dutch-led Cinchona Agreement in 1913 that ensured a
Bark mill Bark mill Bark mills, also known as Catskill’s mills, were water, steam, horse, ox or wind-powered edge mills used to process the bark, roots, and branches of various tree species into a fine powder known as tanbark, used for tanning leather. This powdering allowed the tannin to be extracted more efficiently from its woody source material. A barker would strip the bark from trees so that it might be ground in such mills, and the dried bark was often stored in bark houses. Various machinery was used to chop, grind, riddle and pound the bark. These included Farcot’s bark-cutting machine,