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I
M. S
.
The greatest competitor of Mr. Howe was I. M. Singer. In 1850 there
appeared in a shop in Boston, a man who exhibited a carving machine as his
invention.
Mr. Parton, in the
Atlantic Monthly
, said: "Singer was a poor, baffled
adventurer. He had been an actor and a manager of a theatre, and had tried
his hand at various enterprises, none of which had been successful." The
proprietor of the shop, who had some sewing-machines there on exhibition,
speaking of them, said: "These machines are an excellent invention, but
have some serious defects. Now if you could make the desired
improvement, there would be more money in it than in making these
carving machines." This seemed to gently impress Singer, and the friend
advancing $40, he at once began work. According to Singer's testimony in
the Howe
vs.
Singer suits, the story of this wonderful man runs something
like this:
"I worked day and night, sleeping but three or four hours out of the
twenty-four, and eating generally but once a day, as I knew I must get a
machine made for forty dollars or not get it at all. The machine was
completed the night of the eleventh day from the day it was commenced.
About nine o'clock that evening we got the parts of the machine together,
and commenced trying it. The first attempt to sew was unsuccessful, and
the workmen, who were tired out with almost unremitting work, left me,
one by one, intimating that it was a failure. I continued trying the machine,
with Zieber, who furnished the forty dollars, to hold the lamp for me; but in
the nervous condition to which I had been reduced, by incessant work and
anxiety, was unsuccessful in getting the machine to sew light stitches.
"About midnight I started with Zieber to the hotel, where I boarded. Upon
the way we sat down on a pile of boards, and Zieber asked me if I had not
noticed that the loose loops of thread on the upper side of the cloth came
from the needle? It then flashed upon me that I had forgotten to adjust the
tension upon the needle thread. Zieber and I went back to the shop. I
adjusted the tension, tried the machine, and sewed five stitches perfectly,
when the thread broke. The perfection of those stitches satisfied me that the
machine was a success, and I stopped work, went to the hotel, and had a
sound sleep. By three o'clock the next day I had the machine finished, and
started with it to New York, where I employed Mr. Charles M. Keller to get
out a patent for it."
The trial resulted in favor of Howe, but of the two men Singer was in
every way the superior in business capacity. In fact; there never has been a
sewing-machine manufacturer that could compare with I. M. Singer. "Great
and manifold were the difficulties which arose in his path, but one by one
he overcame them all. He advertised, he traveled, he sent out agents, he
procured the insertion of articles in newspapers, he exhibited the machines
at fairs in town or country. Several times he was on the point of failure, but
in the nick of time something always happened to save him, and year after
year he advanced toward an assured success.
"We well remember his early efforts, when he only had the back part of a
small store on Broadway, and a little shop over a railroad depot; and we
remember also the general incredulity with regard to the value of the
machine with which his name was identified. Even after hearing him
explain it at great length, we were very far from expecting to see him one
day riding to the Central Park in a French diligence, drawn by five horses
paid for by the sewing-machine. Still less did we anticipate that within
twelve years the Singer company would be selling a thousand sewing-
machines a week, at a profit of a thousand dollars a day. He was the true
pioneer of the mere business of selling machines, and made it easier for all
his subsequent competitors."
The peculiarity of the Singer machine is the chain stitch or single thread
device, but with the employment of an eye-pointed needle, and other
appliances, so as to make it admirably adopted for the general purposes of
sewing. At Mr. Singer's death it was found that his estate amounted to about
$19,000,000.
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