Once here, he invented Velox paper — photo printing paper photographers could develop under artificial light — and sold the patent to Eastman Kodak for $1 million.

That gave him money to set up a lab behind his home in Yonkers, N.Y., at the turn of the 20th century, where he started working on a synthetic substitute for shellac, an insulating substance created from beetle shells. Combining phenol and formaldehyde, he came up with a shatterproof, waterproof and fireproof, well, plastic. He also came up with a liquid Bakelite; wood soaked in the substance is used to build boats and ships.
In his day, Baekeland rubbed elbows with the likes of Thomas Edison, Henry Ford, the Wright brothers, Alexander Graham Bell and George Eastman, who found a number of uses for Bakelite in their own creations. There was a time, Karraker said, when every automobile contained 200 parts constructed of the nearly indestructible material.

In 1939, Baekeland sold his patent to Union-Carbide, and retired to Coconut Grove, Fla., where he brewed his own beer, grew grapes to make his own wine and studied botany with a passion.

In 1984, the patent was sold again, this time to Dow Chemical Co.

http://www.amsterdambakelitecollection.com.