Part 121

Strange as it may seem, prior to the year 1845 there had been little change in the tools employed in making shoes. The workman of that period, seated at his low bench, used practically the same implements that were employed by his prototype, the ancient sandal-maker of Egypt. The lap stone, the hammer, the crude needle and the knife being practically the only tools used. Not that there had been no effort to perfect machinery for this purpose; Napoleon I, in his endeavor to secure better shoes for his soldiers, had offered great rewards for the perfecting of shoe machinery that would accomplish this purpose, but although great effort had been made there had been no successful machinery produced.

In this year 1845 the first machine to be widely adopted by the industry was perfected. It was a simple form of rolling machine, which took the place of the lap stone and hammer used by the shoemakers for toughening the leather, and it is said that a man could, in half an hour, obtain the same results from this machine that would require a day’s labor on the part of the hand workman employing the old method of pounding.

This was followed in 1848 by the very important invention by Elias Howe of the sewing machine--which was not adapted for use in connection with sewing leather until several years later. It started, however, an era of great activity among inventors and in 1857 there was perfected a machine for driving pegs, which came into successful operation.

The First Machine for Making Shoes.

This was shortly followed by a very important invention by Lyman E. Blake, of Abington, Mass., of a machine for sewing the soles of shoes and this afterwards became famous as the “McKay Sewing Machine.” This invention of Blake’s was purchased by Gordon McKay, who spent large sums of money in perfecting it, and the first machine was established in Lynn in 1861. The results obtained in the early stages of the machines were of an indifferent nature and it was only after large expenditures and the hiring of a number of different inventors to work upon it that a successful machine was produced.

FRENCH POSTILLION BOOT OF THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY]

~HOW SHOE MACHINERY WAS DEVELOPED~

While the quality of work was pronounced by manufacturers to be a success, few had any faith in the possibility of manufacturing shoes by machinery and McKay met with constant rebuffs in his endeavor to introduce his machine. It is recorded that in his desperation he finally offered to sell all the patent rights in machines which he owned to a syndicate of Lynn manufacturers for the sum of $250,000.00--the amount he had expended--but the offer was refused.

In his dilemma McKay at last offered to shoe manufacturers the use of his machines on a basis, which afterwards became famous and an inherent part of the shoe industry known as “royalty,” whereby McKay placed his machines with manufacturers and participated to a small extent in the amount of money saved. Owing to the fact that shoemakers were leaving rapidly for the front and that there was a great scarcity of footwear, the manufacturers gladly accepted this proposition and the machines were very rapidly introduced.

The success of his early machines accomplished, McKay set about the perfecting of others that would do different parts of the work and there was accordingly great activity on the part of inventors in their endeavor to perfect machines for the wide variety of uses made necessary in the preparation of leather for shoemaking. There were soon machines on the market for a wide variety of purposes--including the lasting of the shoe, cutting the leather and for many other processes necessary in making a complete shoe.

Contemporary with the early success of the McKay machines, a French inventor, August Destoney, conceived the idea of making a machine which would sew turned shoes--then a popular type of footwear for women. After several years of endeavor he finally secured the interest of John Hanan, a famous shoemaker of that time in New York City, and through him the interest of Charles Goodyear--nephew of Goodyear of India-rubber fame.

No sooner had the machine become perfected for the sewing of turned shoes, however, than he set to work to make changes which would fit it to sew welt shoes. (The welt shoe has always been considered the highest type of shoemaking, as, by a very ingenious process, a shoe is made which is perfectly smooth inside; all the other types having a seam of thread or tacks inside which make them of considerable disadvantage. He was able to accomplish this a few years later, although the machines were not in extended use until about 1893, when auxiliary machines for performing important parts of the work were perfected; and from that time headway was made in the manufacture of this high grade type of footwear.

The development of the industry--which has been very rapid with the introduction of machinery--suffered materially in the latter part of the last century through the bitter rivalry of machinery manufacturers, a common process being the enjoining of manufacturers from the use of machines on which it was claimed the patents were infringed and this created a state of great uncertainty in the minds of many of those manufacturing shoes.

This condition finally found its solution in the formation of one large corporation, known in the shoe industry as the “United Shoe Machinery Company,” which purchased the patents for a sufficient number of machines to form a complete system for the “bottoming”--or fastening the soles and heels of shoes--and finishing them.

These machines have been the subject of constant improvement and others have been perfected to take care of operations which, prior to their introduction, were purely hand operations. Each machine has been standardized and so adapted to meet the requirements of those used in connection with it that they collectively form the most remarkable and efficient system of machines used at the present time.

Mention is made of this company owing to the important position it has taken in the organization and advancement of the industry, the American-made shoe being the one commodity of world-wide consumption whose supremacy is not contested.

EMBROIDERED RIDING BOOT WORN BY NOBLES DURING LAST DAYS OF POLISH INDEPENDENCE]

Has wooden heel.]

CHANNEL LIP

CROSS-SECTION OF INSOLE

WOODEN LAST—DETERMINES SIZE AND SHAPE OF SHOE

AN INSOLE

AN INSOLE TACKED TO BOTTOM OF LAST

THE BEGINNING OF A SHOE]

How Shoes Are Made by Machinery

At the present time the types of shoes ordinarily made are but five: the “peg” shoe, which is the cheapest type of shoe made; the “standard screw,” which is used in the soles of the heaviest types of boots; the “McKay sewed,” which is made after the fashion established by Gordon McKay; the “turn” shoe, a light type of shoe which was invented centuries ago and which is still worn at this time to a limited extent; and the “Goodyear welt,” which has been universally adopted as the highest type of footwear.

For this reason, this type of shoe has been selected to show the methods employed in making shoes.

THE GOODYEAR WELT SHOE.--A Goodyear Welt shoe in its evolution from the embryonic state in which it is “mere leather and thread” to the completed product, passes through one hundred and six different pairs of hands and is obliged to conform to the requirements of fifty-eight different machines, each performing with unyielding accuracy the various operations for which they were designed.