Figure 1 7. — Morey and Johnson sewing machine, 

 1849. Below: The machine is marked with the 

 name of its maker, Saffbrd & Williams. The 

 number 49 is a serial number. Missing parts have 

 been replaced with plastic. (Smithsonian photo 

 48400; brass plate: 48400-H.) 



■ss 



'ATFOHDfc WILLIAMS. 



BOSTON MASS 



«9 



Bradshaw's patent accurately described some of the 

 defects of the Howe machine, but other inventors 

 were later to offer better solutions to the problems. 



Although the Bradshaw machine was not in current 

 manufacture, a machine based on it received the 

 seventh United States sewing-machine patent. Patent 

 6,099 was issued to Charles Morey and Joseph B. 

 Johnson on February 6, 1849. Their machine (fig. 

 17) was being offered for sale even before the patent 

 was issued. 



This was the first American patent for a chainstitch 

 machine. The stitch was made by an eye-pointed 

 needle carrying the thread through the fabric; the 

 thread was detained by a hook until the loop was 

 enchained by the succeeding one. The fabric was 

 held vertically by a baster plate in a manner similar 

 to the Howe machine. Although not claimed in the 

 patent description, the Morey and Johnson machine 

 also had a bar device for stripping the cloth from the 

 needle. This bar had a slight motion causing a 

 yielding pressure to be exerted on the cloth. Although 

 the patent was not granted until February 6, 1849, 

 the application had been filed in April of the previous 

 year. The machine was featured in the Scientific 

 American on January 27, 1849 (fig. 18): 



Morey and Johnson Machine — These machines are very 

 accurately adjusted in all their parts to work in harmony, 

 without this they would be of no use. But they are now 

 used in most of the Print Works and Bleach Works in 

 New England, and especially by the East Boston Flour 



Company. It sews about one yard per minute, and we 

 consider it superior to the London Sewing Machine the 

 specification of which is in our possession. It [Morey and 

 Johnson] is more simple — and this is a great deal. . . . 

 The price of a machine and right to use $135. 36 



An improvement in the Morey and Johnson ma- 

 chine was patented by Jotham S. Conant for which 

 he was issued a patent on May 8, 1849. Conant's 

 machine offered a slight modification of the cloth 

 bar and of the method of keeping the cloth taut during 

 the stitching operation. No successful use of it is 

 known. 



A second improvement of the Morey and Johnson 

 patent was also issued on May 8, 1849; this United 

 States patent (No. 6,439) was to John Bachelder for 

 the first continuous, but intermittent, sewing mech- 

 anism. As shown in the patent model (fig. 19), his 

 clothholder consisted of an endless belt supported by 

 and running around three or any other suitable 

 number of cylindrical rollers. A series of pointed 

 wires projected from the surface of the belt near the 

 edge immediately adjacent to the needle. The 

 wires could be placed at regular or irregular distances 

 as required. The shaft of one of the cylindrical 



3« The machine referred to as the London Sewing Machine 

 is the British patent of the Thimonnier machine. This patent 

 was applied for by Jean Marie Magnin and was published by 

 Newton's London Journal, vol. 39, p. 317, as Magnin's invention. 



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