Early "Latex" Gloves

Art Director: I'm working on a small film set in the late 1920's, and we have a medical scene.  It seems that latex gloves did exist at that time, can you tell me please what colour would they be?  Are they loose or tight-fitting?  How thick is the latex?  An image I have seems to show a loose fitting clear glove, almost like today's vinyl gloves - but it's hard to tell from the black and white photo.
I appreciate your input in helping us to be as historically accurate as possible.

Thank you for your time!

John Woon (Senior Latex and Rubber Consultant): Many thanks for the very interesting question.

Before I begin, I'd like to correct the erroneous use of the term "latex" which has been bugging me for years. Scientifically speaking, "latex" is defined as a dispersion of rubber or polymer particles in an aqueous medium.

Therefore, a "latex glove" should mean a glove that is made from either natural rubber latex (e.g. Hevea Brasiliensis or Guayule) or synthetic rubber latex (e.g. Nitrile or Polychloroprene)

It is equally wrong to state in a label that a certain product like glove "contains or does not contain latex" which is practically impossible since latex is a liquid. By the same argument, it is also wrong to state "latex free".

Although the market knows that a "latex glove" means glove made from natural rubber latex in the glove industry, one wonders why and how the experts and scientists from FDA and ASTM in the US could have allowed this error to be so widely spread for so long across the globe.

With that said, let's now talk about your question. The advent of the latex technology which allowed the manufacturing of gloves by dipping a former (i.e. mold) into the latex came only in 1930s'

Long before this period, medical gloves were made by dipping the former into rubber solution (i.e. rubber dissolved in solvent) and the gloves tended to appear slightly brownish and translucent although they could have made it whiter by adding a white pigment (e.g. Titanium dioxide).

It might interest you to know that the first pair of such gloves was made by a doctor in Johns Hopkins Hospital in 1890.

Medical gloves could be either "surgical" or "examination". As recent as 1970s and 1980s, most surgical gloves appeared brownish and clear while examination gloves were (and still are) whiter and more opaque.

Some manufacturers today deliberately make their surgical gloves brown in order to indicate that they are for surgical purpose while others make them brown to reduce eye strain in the O.R. and E.R. by providing good contrast to light-colored organs.

I'd therefore expect the surgical gloves used in 1920s to be brownish and translucent (i.e. clear), somewhat loose fitting and of thickness of around 0.15 to 0.2 mm.

Hope this helps.