id:edanmdm-nmah_1070410 url:edanmdm:nmah_1070410 hash:f88de53ebe4d7bac8da70543f1db0f3b07fc274d type:edanmdm title:1854 - Walter Hunt's Patent Model of a Sewing Machine status:0 content: freetext: date: label:model constructed content:before 1854-06-27 label:patent date content:1854-06-27 name: label:inventor content:Hunt, Walter notes: label:Description content:Sewing Machine Patent Model label:Description content:Patent No. 11,161, Issued June 27, 1854 label:Description content:Walter Hunt of New York, New York label:Description content:Walter Hunt was born in rural Martinsburg, New York, on July 29, 1796. The nearby town of Lowville was the site of a textile mill where Hunt’s family worked. Hunt, adept at providing mechanical solutions to difficult problems, worked with the mill owner, Willis Hoskins, inventing and patenting improvements to the flax spinner in 1826. He traveled to New York City to raise capital for manufacturing the device. label:Description content:Hunt supported his family in New York by speculating in real estate, but his love of creativity was paramount. From 1829 to 1853 his inventions and patents included a knife sharpener; a rope making machine; a heating stove; a wood saw; a flexible spring; several machines for making nails; inkwells; a fountain pen; a bottle stopper; firearms; and a safety pin. label:Description content:In 1833, Hunt invented a sewing machine that used a lockstitch, but failed to patent it. The lockstitch used two threads, one passing through a loop in the other and then both interlocking. This was the first time an inventor had not mimicked a hand stitch. As Joseph N. Kane writes in Necessity’s Child: The Story of Walter Hunt, America’s Forgotten Inventor, “With nothing to serve as a basis or model, with no other machine from which parts could be obtained, he evolved a plan for mechanical sewing which was so revolutionary that had he even dared to suggest it before completion of his model he would have been scoffed at and regarded as insane.” label:Description content:Ten years later, manufacturers searched for ways to mechanize sewing, and inventors turned their energies to patenting improvements to sewing machines. On May 27, 1846, Elias Howe Jr. received Patent No. 4,750 for improvements to the sewing machine, claiming to have created the first machine to sew a lockstitch using two threads. When Howe began to sue manufacturers for royalties, Hunt’s previous work emerged as attorneys argued that Hunt’s invention preceded Howe’s and therefore Howe’s patent claims were invalid. label:Description content:On April 2, 1853, Hunt submitted his application for his 1834 sewing machine, as his invention preceded Howe’s machine. The Patent Office recognized Hunt’s precedence but it did not grant a patent to Hunt because he had not applied for one prior to Howe’s application. Hunt received public credit for his invention, but Howe’s patent remained valid because of a technicality. label:Description content:Later, Hunt was granted a patent for other improvements on the sewing machine. In Hunt’s patent specification for Patent No. 11,161, issued on June 27, 1854, he claimed: “Said improvements consist in the manner of feeding in of the cloth and regulating the length of the stitch solely by the vibrating motion of the needle; in a rotary table or platform, upon which the cloth is placed for sewing; in guides and gages for controlling the line of the seam.” label:Description content:Hunt noted that other sewing machines would jam because the material had to be pushed through the vibrating needle. He created a round rotating top that allowed the cloth to be fed through the needle at an even rate, eliminating the problem of jamming. As in the past, Hunt simply sold off the rights to the machine to others and did not capitalize on it, but he did prove that he had the mechanical ability and the creativity to improve upon the sewing machine. label:Description content:Hunt continued to invent and patent devices until his death in 1859. Several were patented: shirt collars, a reversible metallic heel for shoes, lamp improvements, and a new method for manufacturing shirt fronts, collars, and cuffs. Walter Hunt’s inventive nature was captured in the New York Tribune, which wrote at his death, “For more than forty years, he has been known as an experimenter in the arts. Whether in mechanical movements, chemistry, electricity or metallic compositions, he was always at home: and, probably in all, he has tried more experiments than any other inventor.” label:Location content:Currently not on view topic: label:subject content:Patent Models label:subject content:Invention setName: label:See more items in content:Cultural and Community Life: Textiles label:See more items in content:Patent Models, Sewing Machines label:See more items in content:Sewing Machines label:See more items in content:Textiles label:See more items in content:Patent Models publisher: label:Related Publication content:Janssen, Barbara Suit. Patent Models Index label:Related Publication content:Cooper, Grace Rogers. The Sewing Machine: Its Invention and Development label:Related Web Publication content:http://www.sil.si.edu/DigitalCollections/HST/Cooper/CF/view.cfm creditLine: label:Credit Line content:Gift of Clinton N. Hunt in honor of the Hunt Family dataSource: label:Data Source content:National Museum of American History identifier: label:ID Number content:TE.T07781 label:catalog number content:T07781.000 label:patent number content:011161 label:accession number content:139439 objectType: label:Object Name content:sewing machine patent model label:Object Type content:Patent Model physicalDescription: label:Physical Description content:brass (overall material) label:Physical Description content:wood (base material) label:Measurements content:overall: 7 in x 10 in x 6 in; 17.78 cm x 25.4 cm x 15.24 cm indexedStructured: date: 1850s name: Hunt, Walter topic: Inventions Patent Models, Sewing Machines Textiles object_type: Patents Sewing machines (equipment) Models online_media_type: Images descriptiveNonRepeating: guid:http://n2t.net/ark:/65665/ng49ca746a9-375a-704b-e053-15f76fa0b4fa title: label:Title content:1854 - Walter Hunt's Patent Model of a Sewing Machine record_ID:nmah_1070410 unit_code:NMAH title_sort:1854 - WALTER HUNT'S PATENT MODEL OF A SEWING MACHINE data_source:National Museum of American History online_media: media: guid:http://n2t.net/ark:/65665/bq99ca746b6-8b8c-704b-e053-15f76fa0b4fa type:Images idsId:NMAH-DOR2010-0980-000001 usage: access:CC0 content:https://ids.si.edu/ids/deliveryService?id=NMAH-DOR2010-0980-000001 thumbnail:https://ids.si.edu/ids/deliveryService?id=NMAH-DOR2010-0980-000001&max=150 guid:http://n2t.net/ark:/65665/bq99ca746b6-8b8d-704b-e053-15f76fa0b4fa type:Images idsId:NMAH-DOR2010-0984-000001 usage: access:CC0 content:https://ids.si.edu/ids/deliveryService?id=NMAH-DOR2010-0984-000001 thumbnail:https://ids.si.edu/ids/deliveryService?id=NMAH-DOR2010-0984-000001&max=150 guid:http://n2t.net/ark:/65665/bq99ca746b6-8b8e-704b-e053-15f76fa0b4fa type:Images idsId:NMAH-DOR2010-0987-000001 usage: access:CC0 content:https://ids.si.edu/ids/deliveryService?id=NMAH-DOR2010-0987-000001 thumbnail:https://ids.si.edu/ids/deliveryService?id=NMAH-DOR2010-0987-000001&max=150 guid:http://n2t.net/ark:/65665/bq99ca746b6-8b8f-704b-e053-15f76fa0b4fa type:Images idsId:NMAH-DOR2010-0991-000001 usage: access:CC0 content:https://ids.si.edu/ids/deliveryService?id=NMAH-DOR2010-0991-000001 thumbnail:https://ids.si.edu/ids/deliveryService?id=NMAH-DOR2010-0991-000001&max=150 guid:http://n2t.net/ark:/65665/bq99ca746b6-8b90-704b-e053-15f76fa0b4fa type:Images idsId:NMAH-DOR2010-0998-000001 usage: access:CC0 content:https://ids.si.edu/ids/deliveryService?id=NMAH-DOR2010-0998-000001 thumbnail:https://ids.si.edu/ids/deliveryService?id=NMAH-DOR2010-0998-000001&max=150 mediaCount:5 metadata_usage: access:CC0 version:0 linkedId:0 unitCode:NMAH timestamp:1655973825 docSignature:0b4ab6ec55e1e95d5cc7335d2e736a51 publicSearch:1 linkedContent:0 lastTimeUpdated:1655973778