Aniline Germany. Today, the name of BASF, originally "Badische Anilin- und Soda-Fabrik" (English: Baden Aniline and Soda Factory), now the largest chemical supplier, echoes the legacy of the synthetic dye industry, built via aniline dyes and extended via the related azo dyes. The first azo dye was aniline yellow. In the late 19th century, aniline emerged as an analgesic drug, its cardiac-suppressive side effects countered with caffeine. During the first decade of the 20th century, while trying to modify synthetic dyes to treat African sleeping sickness, Paul Ehrlich – who had coined the term "chemotherapy" for his "magic bullet" approach to
Clayton Aniline Company new vat dyes complex (buildings 188, 189 and 190). The completion of the vat dyes project was held up by the outbreak of war in 1939. In 1940, a new Ministry of Supply factory (building 300) was constructed adjacent to the site for the manufacture of explosives additive Centralite I. The company also gained an important contract to manufacture monomethylaniline used as an antiknock agent in high octane aviation fuel. In 1941, a new aniline plant was built with an output of around 100 tons per week. On 5 October 1942, a near catastrophe befell the site when an ethylation