The Abilene reflector. [volume] (Abilene, Kan.) 1883-1888, 1884-05-22
Six Pairs of Shoes a Minute.


penitenti:ry few hundreds of men
and turn out $500 pairs of shoes in ten
hours, or more than six pairs of shoes
a minute. The men and women have
little to do with it. Machines do the
work. and need only to be fed. started,
and stopped; all the fine and ingenious
work of building beautiful shoe they
do, one part at a time and one ma
chine to each part. For instance. the
first machine cuts the soles out of the
leather. 1t is nothing but a punch
fitted with knife the shape of shoe
sole. Different sized knives cut out
anything, from baby's to plantation
darkey's size. Cutting out the soles
leaves the sheets of leather in tatters.
The biggest tatters are used for heels;
the smallest make fuel. Leather scraps
make as good furnace fire as coal
does. The next machine splits thin
slice of the upper surface of the sole a
little way from the edge all around, so
that it looks as if thin sheet had been
pasted on to the sole, leaving the edges
unpasted. Under this loose. edge a
machine presses little gutter or chan
mel in which the mailing or sewing
is done, and afterward hidden by
FASTING the loose edge over it when the
upper is attached.
At the same moment other convictS
are cutting uppers out of sheets OF
dressed calfskin. They lay patterns on
the skins and thus cut the needed sizes.
This is done by hand. but the Innings
are sewed to the uppers, and the button
holes are put through both leather and
lining by machinery. The buttonholes
are stitched by automatic machines,
consisting of sewing machine having
under the needle little plate which
turns exactly in accordance with the
outlines of the buttonhole, and stops
when the buttonhole is finished. One
man feeds several machines, starts
them, and does not touch them while
they are at work. After this the soles
and uppers come into the hands of one
set of convicts, the lasters and tackers
on. who put the two together with a
very few small tacks. These people all
work like lightning, but are slow be-
side the machinery.
The soles and uppers are firmly joined
in several ways. One machine puts in
brass screws and bites them off exactly
at the right distance between the upper
and the under surface of the leather:
another drives in an iron screw with
the same nicely; another sews the parts
together with wax thread, the thread
passing through heated metal horn,
which keeps it soft and warm; yet an
other initiates hand sewing with yellow
thread, leaving an extended sole, which
is afterward bevelled to look pretty.
The merit of this machine is that the
shoes it sews are pliable and easy to
the foot, and bring good price. This
does its work in eleven seconds.
The heels are made separately. and
when finished have all the nails pro-
jecting half an inch below the bottom
of the lower sheet of leather. A con-
vict puts one of these heels into metal
cup in press of great power. and over
that he rests shoe in the right posi-
ton. Then down comes q great bar
and squeezes the heel and shoe together,
driving every other nail all the way in
and leaving every other nail sticking a
little way out. He takes the shoe out,
puts pretty heel tap in, puts the shoe
back, submits it to the pressure, and
then withdraws it, and finds the tap
firmly nailed, with the nails not quite
through the tap. which presents a
smooth, unbroken under service. The
heel-shaving machine presents to the
heel a set of rapidly revolving knives.
shaped to make 3 straight heel or a
guttered one, or even lady's French
heel. Another machine cuts the front
of the heel square, and another trims
and smooths the edge of the sole. The
edge of the sole and the sides of the
heel are blackened and the edge is put
under hot iron about the size of a fat
chestnut. This iron moves to and fro
with incredible rapidity, in imitation of
the motions of the cobblers who used
to do the work by hand. A large iron.
also heated by gas jet. does the same
thing for the heel, and does it under
such pressure that cracks and uneven
nesses in the heel are smoothed over,
filled up and concealed.
Some shoe uppers have eyelet holes
machine in the prison for doing this
work. 1t has two steel rods close to one
another. and while one punches the
holes the other inserts the eyelets,
which run down little gutter. right
side up, exactly in q place to fix into
the punctures in the leather, and to
have their edges squeezed over by the
other rod and the piece that fits upon it.
Twenty years ago shoemaking ma
chinery performed only one-half this
work and did that roughly Now the
shoes made in Crow Hill prison arc such
as most persons wear. and are in all
RESPECTS shapely, presentable and well
finished. Some of them retail for four
dollars or five dollars a pair. Il
In this prison. side by side with the
scum, OF humanity. reputable men and
girls are employed. There are prob
ably two hundred girls in the female
prison who live in Brooklyn. come
every morning, aud are free to &C
home whenever they present ticket at
the prison door. The Warden. who is,
in all probability, not consulted, since
these persons work for the contractors,
was asked what he thought was the
elect of such surroundings upon the
youths of good morals. He replied that
there used to a general feeling that the
arrangement was improper and danger
Gus, but it has not proved so. Outside
free labor has been employed in Crow
Hill eleven or twelve years, and Of all
the hundreds who have thus come
daily to the prison not one has ever been
sent there as prisoner. The outsiders
do not have anything to do with the
prisoners. They sit apart, and never.
under any circumstances, speak word
to the convicts.-N Y. sam.
"A quantity of ore from the Ellen
vile On. W gold mine sent to q New