Mechanics of the sewing machine.. by Singer Sewing Machine Company

Author:Singer Sewing Machine Company
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Sewing machines
Publisher: New York, N.Y.
Published: 1914-03-25T05:00:00+00:00

The First Singer

The sowing machine has justly been called "America's Chief Contribution to Civilization," and one of tlie principal causes for the general diffusion of well-being among the people of the United States is found in the wonderfully diverse uses of mechanical contrivances to take the place of manual labor. So far as men and women can substitute for the direct output of physical strength the more intelligent effort of guiding a machine, they are so far uplifted in the scale of being, because they are enabled to make their lives more interesting as well as more productive.

It is in the invention of machinery—^which not only economizes but elevates human nature—that American ingenuity excels; and the Singer Sewing Machine is one of the most conspicuous examples of this kind of invention.

Most of the really great inventions have been products of slow growth rather than an inspiration, and the sewing machine is no exception to the rule. It had been in process of evolution for more than a century previous to 1850 when Isaac Merritt Singer's versatile brain became attracted to the problem of machine sewing.

His first machine, patented Aug. 12, 1851, had a vertical needle movement, driven by a rotary overhanging shaft, and a roughened feed wheel extending through a slot in the table. A

yielding presser foot alongside the needle held down the work. Motion was given to the needle arm and the shuttle by gearing. It used two threads and made the lock stitch, the loop of the needle thread being interlocked at each downward movement by the thread of a reciprocating shuttle.

The patented features of Singer's invention showed no wide departures from the developments of earlier inventors. It was the practical adaptation and utilization of his own and other ideas that marked his inventions, some of which were not fully appreciated when they might have been patented but were neglected. As an example, the combination of the rotary shaft in the overhanging arm, also the rocking treadle. Both of these are now dominant in sewing machine construction.

The ground floor of sewing machine invention was established before Singer came on the field. It was too late for original dominant patents, but his clear perception of other men's work which was at his hand led him in the line that succeeding invention was to follow.

Singer had a hard struggle at the outset; he was poor and had to contend with popular prejudice due to the previous failures of others to produce a successful working machine. Slowly he gained ground; gradually he obtained access to the public so that by degrees his machine received a trial and was shown successfully to accomplish continuous stitching.

The leading counsel for Singer in all his early trials soon became actively interested as an equal partner in the business, he having fully comprehended at an early day the great value of the sewing machine as a factor in the world's industrial development. The firm of I. M. Singer & Co. was now formed. Its policy always

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