Molly Shonka, age 11, of Bellevue, Neb., for her question:
WHO INVENTED THE SEWING MACHINE?
Special sewing machines available today are designed to do a wide variety of jobs. There's one, for example, that will sew up shoes and boots. Another will sew up brooms. One type of sewing machine stitches carpets, and since carpets are often too heavy to be moved easily, the sewing machine travels along the rug as it does its job.
A machine that uses a needle to bind cloth together with thread is called a sewing machine. It saves a lot of time: It can do in a few minutes a job that used to take many hours to complete. Because of the sewing machine, mass production of clothing is possible.
An Englishman named Thomas Saint patented the first sewing machine in 1790. His contraption made a single thread chain stitch and was used to attach two pieces of leather. Thread was fed automatically to a needle which had a notch instead of an eye. A small awl made holes for the needle to pass through the leather.
Saint's machine wasn't too practical. But then in 1830 a Frenchman named Barthelemy Thimonnier came up with a patent that used a hooked needle that made a stitch by passing backward and forward through cloth. Soon operators on 80 machines were working on soldiers' uniforms at the same time. A mob of angry workmen almost killed Thimonnier because they felt his invention would put many men out of work.
An American named Elias Howe invented a sewing machine in 1846 that is much like the equipment we use today. Howe's unit had a needle with an eye near the point. A shuttle carried a thread below the cloth on a small bobbin while the needle, carrying an upper thread, was fastened to an arm that vibrated on a pivot. Movement of the arm forced the needle through the cloth. The shuttle carried the upper thread through the loop of the upper thread and made a lock stitch. Most present day machines use this double thread, lock stitch system.
There are three types of sewing machines today: the straight needle, the swing needle and the slant needle. The straight needle machine is designed to make home sewing quick and easy. The slant needle sewing machine is similar but it has a needle that slants toward the user so the work can be seen more easily. The swing needle type is especially right for those who do decorative sewing, such as zigzag stitching.
America's famous Singer Sewing Machine Co. was the first to put electric motors on sewing machines in 1889. Inventor Isaac Singer came up with many fine innovations.
Europe also provides lots of sewing machines. The Anker and Pfaff come from Germany, the Necchi and Borletti are built in Italy, while the Viking is made in Sweden.
The four motion automatic feed used on most present¬day machines was invented in 1854 by an American named A.B. Wilson.