I wondered what the Mercury actually did with the felt, as I couldn’t think of anything from the top of my hat:
Mercury made the felting process in hat production more efficient. The compound used to moisten the fibers was Mercury Nitrate, a process known as carroting. It produced a superior-quality felt, which in turn, resulted in higher-quality hats
Nine out of ten hatters recommend that you don’t do this. The tenth hatter purple monkey dishwasher.
(Victorian-era hat makers were notorious for going mad because they used mercury to treat felt cloth.)
Is this the origin story of The Mad Hatter? 🙄
I think the original idiom was “mad as a hatter” which was eventually shortened to “mad hatter”, possibly due to the Alice in Wonderland character.
I wondered what the Mercury actually did with the felt, as I couldn’t think of anything from the top of my hat: