Crawford avalanche. (Grayling, Mich.) 1879-19??, 1896-07-09

Their Antiquity. Manufacture and Wide
spread Use.
Pins, as the saying goes, are as old as
the hills. In some form or other they
have been In existence ever since our
first parents clothed themselves In ne
leaves, which grew wild In the Garden
Of Eden. AS a matter Of fact pins
claim very high antiquity, the earliest
form being the natural thorn, which
Is still used to some extent by the pres
ent women of Upper Egypt. In prehis-
toric times pins were also made OF
small bones Of fish and animals.
Among the remains Of the lake dwell
ers of Europe have been found bronze
pins and bronze brooches, In which the
pins form the prominent feature, many
Of which are highly ornamented and
very beautiful. A few copper and one
iron pin have also been found. 1t is
estimated that 10000 pins have been
collected at the Lacustrine station, In
Switzerland, alone. A few Of these
pins double stems, and were probably
used as hairpins. Three have been
found at Peschiera, which are exactly
the same in form as the safety pin Of
the present time. Among the single
stem pins are many ingenious devices
for preventing the spike from passing
entirely through the cloth or other
material it is used for fastening to-
gether. Many of them are SO formed
that they are thicker in some places
than in others. A large number, both
Of bronze and bone, have the head
formed by loose ring passed through
an eye in the pin. A few heads have
been discovered, while In ancient Rome
bronze pins and bone hairpins, with or
namental heads, have been discovered
among relics Of Pompeii.
In England, the ordinary dOmes-
tic pin had become in the if
teenth century an article Of sufficient
Importance to warrant legislative no
tice. An act Of Parliament passed in
1S43 prohibited the importation of pins.
AS a necessity of the toilet pins were
introduced into England in the latter
part of the fifteenth century by Cath
arine Howard, Queen of Henry WILL,
who received them from France, says
the st. Louis Republic"
Very good pins were made at this
period Of brass, but a large portion Of
them were made of iron, which were
blanched and sold for brass pins. In
order to prevent this imposition upon
the good people Of England, Parlia-
ment, in 1913, passed an act providing
that mo person shall put on sale any
pins but such as shall be double-headed
shanks of the pins, well smOothed, the
shanks well shapen, the point well
rounded, filed, canted and sharpened."
England depended upon France for
its supply Of pins until 1926, when John
Tilsby introduced the manufacture in
Worcestershire. His business grew to
such an extent that it Is said he gave
employment to 1900 persons; at any
rate, his pins, Stroud pins, as they were
called, gained high reputation. In
1886 the manufacture was introduced
into Bristol and Birmingham, the latter
place ultimately becoming the great
center Of the industry.
Pins in America made their first APP
pearance during the last century. In
1775 prize was offered to the colonists
Of Carolina, who introduced the first
native pins and needles. During the
war of 1912, when, owing to the restric-
tons upon commerce, the price of pins
rose to 81 per paper, the manufacture
was actually started in the United
States, but does not seem to have met
with success, as the enterprise was
soon abandoned. The industry was not
fairly started in this country until the
year 1886.