MANUFACTURE OF BOOTS AND SHOES. 



53 



of all of them machines more or less satisfactory in their work- 

 ings have been devised. The parts of the uppers are now sewed 

 together by machinery, and they are pegged, sewed, or screwed to 

 the sole by machinery. Instead of the lapstone and the hammer 

 for condensing the leather are now swiftly revolving rollers, and 

 instead of the patterns for cutting out the soles are dies or sole- 

 shaped knives set in machines. 



But the field of shoe machinery is such a wide and complex 

 one that it will be impossible to do more than glance at what may 

 be termed the epoch-making inven- 

 tions. The first great step was made 

 when the sewing machine was in- 

 vented and the alert manufacturers 

 were able to turn it to their pur- 

 poses. But the distinction of the 

 sewing machine does not belong to 

 the shoe manufacturers. The in- 

 vention, however, which did deter- 

 mine their future was that which 

 led to the fastening of the sole of 

 the shoe to the upper by machinery. 

 The solution of this problem had 

 been the real difficulty in the way 

 of applying machinery to the work, 

 and when it had been met the sin- 

 gle-story shoe-shop had made way 



for the factory ; its dozen journeymen had lost their individuality 

 in the hundreds of operatives, and the pin-money which the wives 

 of the farmers, or the farmers themselves, had made from the 

 job-work doled out to them by the manufacturers had become a 

 thing of the past. From that dates the shoe industry of to-day. 

 From it also have come the growth and prosperity of important 

 communities in Maine, New Hampshire, and Massachusetts, in 

 New York, Pennsylvania, and the older West. As in the solution 

 of most such problems, it was not hit upon at once. There were 

 failures which were the forerunners of nothing, and failures which 

 were the forerunners of success. 



Two of these latter are worthy of note, as they contained 

 within them the suggestions which, a half-century later, were 

 put into practical operation. The first of these attempts was 

 made in 1809 by David Meade Randolph. He devised a way 

 for fastening the soles and heels to the inner sole by means of 

 nails. His plan was to use lasts covered at the bottoms with me- 

 tallic plates, so that the nails, when driven through the soles, were 

 clinched on this piece of metal. The next year Mark Isambard 

 Brunei, the eminent engineer, carried this idea a step further. He 



Fig. 7. Goodyear Stitching Machine. 

 This is one of the machines in what 

 is termed the Goodyear welt system. 



