Figure 11. — Greenough's patent model, 1842. (Smithsonian photo 45525-G.) 



groove in the gears was a peculiarly shaped needle 

 bent in two places to permit it to be held in place by 

 the gears and with a point at one end and the eye at 

 the opposite end, as in a common hand needle. The 

 action of the gears caused the fabric to be forced onto 

 and through the threaded needle. Indefinite straight 

 seams could be stitched as the fabric was continuously 

 forced off the needle by the turning gears (fig. 12). 

 A screw clamp held the machine to a table or other 

 work surface. Machines of this and similar types 

 reportedly had some limited usage in the dyeing and 

 bleaching mills, 27 where lengths of fabric were stitched 

 together before processing. Improved versions of 

 Bean's machine were to be patented in subsequent 

 years in England and America. The same principle 

 was also used in home machines two decades later. 



The third sewing-machine patent on record in the 

 United States Patent Office is patent 3,389 issued on 

 December 27, 1843, to George H. Corliss, better 

 remembered as the inventor and manufacturer of the 

 Corliss steam engine. It was his interest in the sewing 

 machine, however, that eventually directed his 

 attention to the steam engine. 



Corliss had a general store at Greenwich, New York. 

 A customer's complaint that the boots he had pur- 

 chased split at the seams made Corliss wonder why 

 someone had not invented a machine to sew stronger 

 seams than hand-sewn ones. He considered the 

 problem of sewing leather, analyzing the steps re- 

 quired to make the saddler's stitch, one popularly 

 used in boots and shoes. He concluded that a sewing 

 machine to do this type of work must first perforate 

 the leather, then draw the threads through the holes, 

 and finally secure the stitches by pulling the threads 

 tight. The machine Corliss invented (fig. 13) was 

 of the same general type as Greenough's, except that 

 two two-pointed needles were required to make the 

 saddler's stitch. This stitch was composed of two 

 running stitches made simultaneously, one from each 

 side. 28 The machine used two awls to pierce the holes 

 through which the needles passed ; finger levers 



2; Edward H. Knight, Sewing Machines, vol. 3 of Knight's 

 American Mechanical Dictionary. 



28 A seam using the saddler's stitch appears as a neat line 

 of touching stitches on both sides. Even when made by hand, 

 it is sometimes misidentified by the casual observer as the 

 lockstitch because of the uniformity of both sides. If the saddler's 

 stitch was formed of threads of two different colors, the even 

 stitches on one side of the seam and the odd stitches on the 

 reverse side would be of one color, and vice versa. 



14 



