Editor’s Note: In the September 1999 issue of Farm Collector, Ralph Look, Wichita, Kan., wrote to ask for information on the Western Electric sewing machine. His query was answered by representatives of the Sharon D. Ansted-Williams Memorial Library.
More than 150 years ago, on Sept. 10, 1846, a patent was granted to Elias Howe Jr. for the sewing machine. No invention has so touched the everyday life of mankind like the sewing machine. The clothes that we wear, many of the furnishings in our homes, even the automobiles that we drive, have in some way benefited by this marvelous invention.
Before the sewing machine, few people had more than one change of clothes. Sewn by hand, tailor-made clothes were reserved for the wealthy, and properly fitting clothes were a luxury. Shoes were held together with pegs, and there was no “left” or “right” shoe. The shoemaker was known as the cobbler, a term that illustrates the difficulty of producing a quality product.
The first sewing machines were operated by hand. The foot treadle – Isaac Singer’s innovation – would dramatically improve the operation of the machine.
In 1885, Charles Cretors, the inventor of the popcorn machine, advertised a small steam engine suitable to operate a sewing machine.
Thomas Edison was among the first to advocate the use of electricity to operate machinery for the home. “Washing machines, cream separators, and sewing machines could be coupled to an electric motor and would reduce the labor of the servant and home maker,” he wrote. By the end of the nineteenth century, Westinghouse Electric offered a small electric motor that could be attached to a sewing machine.
The popularity of this invention encouraged diverse companies to enter into the production of sewing machines. After the Civil War, E. Remington and Sons, the well-known arms maker in Illion, N.Y., would turn to the manufacture of agricultural equipment, later producing the Empire Sewing Machine. By the turn of the century, waves of consolidation swept through the companies making sewing machines, and only a few continued in production.
Western Union, a company which had established a reputation in the telegraph industry, recognized the sewing machine’s market potential and offered a machine with its name affixed to it.
Western Electric also offered a machine. Associated with the American Telephone and Telegraph Company (AT&T), the company went on to market dishwashers, washing machines and other electrical appliances for the home. The Western Electric sewing machine was not made by Western Electric, but by the National Sewing Machine Company, Belvidere, Ill., which put Western Electric decals on one of their models.
The electric motor, however, was produced by Western Electric. Production lasted only a few years; the machine disappeared from the market by 1918. Western Electric would continue to be recognized as a leader in the design and manufacture of telecommunications equipment. FC
Our thanks to the Sharon D. Ansted-Williams Memorial Library, a branch of the Deseret Museum of Science and Industry, Beethovan A. Williams, curator, for providing this material.
