1888

From waste chemical paranitrophenol lying around back of Bayer’s plant, graduate fellow Oskar Hinsberg produced acetophenetidine, patented as Phenacetin. It was Bayer’s “ground-breaking product, the first really big hit of the nascent pharmaceutical business” (Jeffreys, 64ff.) Several months later, flu epidemic swept Europe and North America  great demand for fever-reducing meds. “Phenacetin was one of the few effective therapies available, and Bayer cashed in.” Phenacetin transformed a small, struggling dye company into a major pharmaceutical firm. Bayer followed the same year with the sedative Sulfonal, and then a refined version, Trional.