You say, "I might agree that the quantities were larger starting in the 1920s, but 1926 is not a magic date."

1926 sort of IS a "magic date." It was the year that the Bakelite company announced their NEW LINE of translucent colored phenolic plastics. And, it was in 1928, two years later, that Catelin negotiated and received the Bakelite Patent, and began to produce their own lines of cast phenolic goods.

You say, "It certainly appears that the 1920s and 1930s (and maybe into the 1940s) were the "hey-days" of cast phenolic beads."

GREAT. THAT is what I said. J.