HOWE 



2854 



HOWE 



emy, Texas Dental College and a number of 

 private schools and business colleges. 



Industries. In the rich agricultural country 

 surrounding Houston, winter vegetables, rice, 

 cotton, sugar cane, corn, alfalfa and citrous 

 fruits are the principal crops. Large cape 

 jessamine nurseries cultivate both the blos- 

 soms and plants for an extensive market. Iron 

 and lignite are found in the neighborhood, and 

 oil fields close at hand increase the commercial 

 importance of the city. Cotton compresses, 

 oil mills, planing mills, foundries and machine 

 shops, rolling mills, pencil factories, potteries, 

 brick and tile works, petroleum and sugar 

 refineries, rice mills and elevator, a coffee- 

 roasting establishment, carriage and wagon 

 shops and large railroad shops represent the 

 chief industrial enterprises. Cotton, corn, 

 sugar, rice and quantities of other produce are 

 shipped by rail and boat. 



History. The city was settled in 1836 and 

 named in honor of General Sam Houston 

 (which see). It was the capital of the Republic 

 of Texas during the years 1837-1839 and 1842- 

 1845. In 1907 the city adopted the commission 

 form of government. M.W. 



HOWE, how, ELIAS (1819-1867), the inventor 

 of the first practical sewing machine, a device 

 that revolutionized the dressmaking industry 

 and has immeasurably lightened the burdens 

 of women throughout the world. Howe was 

 born in Spencer. 

 Mass., where in 

 his youth he 

 worked as a me- 

 chanic in his 

 father's mills. 

 While employed 

 in a machine 

 shop in Cam- 

 bridge, Mass., he 

 conceived the 

 idea of a machine 

 that would take 

 the place of hand 

 labor in sewing, and his first experiments with 

 what was to be an epoch-making invention 

 were made in a humble little garret he called 

 his home. An old school friend having made 

 him a loan of $500, Howe succeeded in com- 

 pleting a model of his machine in 1845. The 

 following year he secured a patent, but it was 

 only after a long period of poverty and dis- 

 couragement that he gained any substantial 

 reward for his ingenuity and perseverance and 

 his desire to help the world. 



ELIAS HOWE 



There was so much opposition to the new 

 machine in America that in 1847 the young 

 inventor went to England, hoping to obtain 

 financial assistance from capitalists in that 

 country. In this he was disappointed, and 

 after selling the English rights to his invention 

 for $1,000, he returned to America. During 

 his absence several manufacturers had in- 

 fringed upon his patent rights, and he found 

 a number of sewing machines on the market. 

 To protect his invention and establish his 

 patent Howe was forced to spend long years 

 in wearisome lawsuits, but he finally won, and 

 eventually he earned a great fortune by manu- 

 facturing sewing machines and through royal- 

 ties from other manufacturers. Howe was one 

 of the Connecticut volunteers in the War of 

 Secession. In 1867, the year of his death, he 

 received the gold medal and the cross of the 

 Legion of Honor at the Paris Exposition. See 

 SEWING MACHINE. 



HOWE, JOSEPH (1804-1873), a Canadian 

 journalist, orator and statesman, who was re- 

 sponsible, more than any other man, for the 

 establishment of responsible government in 

 Nova Scotia. He was the political idol of that 

 province for a 

 generation, and is 

 considered the 

 greatest English- 

 speaking orator 

 Canada has pro- 

 duced. Joseph 

 Howe's father 

 was John Howe 

 (1752-1835), who 

 was a printer and 

 newspaper editor 

 in Boston, Mass. 

 When the Revolutionary War began he re- 

 mained loyal to the king, and like hundreds 

 who shared his views, emigrated to Nova 

 Scotia, where he was for many years post- 

 master-general of the Maritime Provinces. 

 There, at Halifax, Joseph Howe was born on 

 December 13, 1804. He had little formal 

 schooling, but was taught in many subjects by 

 his father. At the age of thirteen his brother, 

 then the owner of the Halifax Gazette, took 

 him as an apprentice, and later employed him 

 as a journeyman compositor. The boy ac- 

 quired a reputation for quick wit and intelli- 

 gence and also for numerous little poems which 

 he contributed to the Gazette. 



Journalism and Fame. In 1827, being then 

 twenty-three, he embarked in the newspaper 



JOSEPH HOWE 



