Advertisement for cellulose derivatives manufactured and sold by the Hercules Powder Company for use as a base in plastic molding compounds, including Nitrocellulose, Cellulose Acetate, and Ethyl Cellulose. The advertisement features an artistic rendering of a pair of plastic horse figurines representative of those manufactured from cellulose derivatives superimposed with a rendering of the long, complex chemical structure of cellulose. This advertisement was published in the June 1940 issue of Modern Plastics magazine.

Formed in 1912 as part of an anti-trust settlement with DuPont, the Hercules Powder Company (later Hercules Inc.) initially specialized in the manufacture of explosives and smokeless powders and subsequently diversified its business to encompass a variety of industrial products, including pine and paper chemicals, synthetics, pigments, polymers, and cellulose.