[1] By 1937, it employed more than two hundred people in Bristol, Tennessee, including six graduate pharmaceutical chemists.
The company was responsible for the elixir sulfanilamide disaster of 1937, described as one of the most consequential mass poisonings of the 20th century.
The company claimed to have been unaware of the toxicity of diethylene glycol, despite the existence of published studies describing its dangerous properties.
The elixir was released with no safety testing, leading to the deaths of at least one hundred people in fifteen states.
The resulting scandal led to the passage of the 1938 Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act.