The Democratic banner. (Mt. Vernon, Ohio) 1898-192?, 1915-09-14
WOODEN
Leg Industry Is Now A Big
Thing

Detroit Free Press)
War is the father of the artificia leg,
and 1t is in no way surprising that Eu-
rope is looking to the United States to
supply an increasing demand for sub
stitutes, almost If not quite as good as
the real legs that are now being sacr-
rificed.
Earlier forms of warfare, before gun
powder was invented, were not espec-
tally hard on legs. Although these use
full members were sometimes lost and
wooden supports substituted as far
back as the Greeks and Romans, it
was not until the Napoleonic era that
the plain substantial and unmstable
peg became an object of inventive
thought and developed into the modern
device that lends artistic verisimili
tude to a utilitarian purpose.
The Napoleonc wars doomed the leg
industry abroad, and the Civil War
later boosted it in this country to such
effect that we are now the legmakers
par excellence. Our legs, SO to speak,
are the best legs; and one effect of the
war vii be to set thousands of Euro
pean citizens walking on legs made in
America" Although vastly multiplied,
| this will be no new condition. Many
Europeans already have American legs
| Their is at least one American leg,
made in Boston, sharing the duty OF
| locomoton with a natural born Chin
ese leg in China, unless the owner
has died and his Boston leg has been
buried with him for use in heaven.
1t is rather an interesting subject,
practiced by one knows not how many
persons he sees in a days journey.
If the ambition of Napoleon created
the need there was the inventive gen
ius of Mr.. Mann and Mr.. Pott to sup
ply it. So bright with promise was this
new field of human endeavor that it
now includes upward of 500 patents in
the United States.
The credit of making the first sue
cessfully deceptive leg is variously
claimed. Germany points to Herr Won
Holtzbein, of Berlin, who lost leg in
the cavalry charge aginst the French
in 1906, and employed his enforced lei
sure in making himself another.
Wortzeburg claims similar invention
at about the same time. Holland is
proud of Verduyn as the first man who
made practicable wooden foot.
In England there appeared, so close
together as to puzzle historians, the
so-lalled Nann's leg--it was made also
: for women-and the Auglesey leg made
by Mr.. Pott for the Marquis of Angles
ey and named in his honor. In London
Mr. Cork was then making the leg that
has so obscured the subject on its ma
terial side and still leads many mis-
informed people to believe the story ol
the mischievous schoolboy who stuck
pins in the unconscious leg of his
teacher. 1t Is time to explode the fal
lacy. Cork has never been successful
ly used for legs they have been made
, by Cork, but not of cork. Mr.. Cork
} moreover, was of the old regime, peg
logger and very likely conservative
artist who would hold that to make s
wooden leg look like real one is fals'
g art Mr.. Potts leg was cumbersome
heavy affair of wood leather and metal
! as compared with the neat, six-pount
s leg of our own time; he made also
!. riding leg" with which the delighted
n Marquis was able to maintain his fin
! reputation as a horseman.
1t was Anglesey leg-and here w
II seem to be walking on firm ground
that was introduced to the uniped put
S lie in America by William Selpho,
o former associate of the inventor. Bos
e ton, however, can Justly claim the frs
successful motive effort to salve thi
Z pedestrian problem with the Paine
IL leg, followed by the Drake leg, whic
H. also does honor to the New Englan
n metropolis New Hampshire supple
Is the BLY, leg and astOnished waitin
world with an ankle that moved sid'
ways as well as forward as backward
NThere was also Salem leg and
Douglss leg.