Evening star., 1918-07-28

lowing the machine to do the rest.
AS to the output. the factory visited
here Is now making about 5000 pairs
Of shoes q day and its product is
steadily increasing.
*.H
The big factories which are now
working on soldiers shoes cover many
acres and they employ thousands of
hands. The buildings are made Of iron
and glass. Those at Manchester are Of
four or nve stories. and they have the
best of light and ventilation. They
include many buildings. all of which
are filled with. machinery. each being
devoted to it's own special work
There is one large establishment
where the leather is cut. This is done
by what Is known as clicking ma
chimes. by which eight pairs of soles
can be cut a minute. The operators
are skilled men who have to get all
they can out of each hide, and that
without waste. The leather is cut by
steel dies of the shape of the pieces
twisted this way and that to save
leather. They are laid on the leather
and the operator moves swinging
beam over the die. which presses 1t
down SO that 1t cuts out the part.
Every bit Of leather Ia saved. and the
smallest scraps are carried away to
use in other parts of the shoe. In
some of the rooms I saw girls cut
ting up the scraps into large and small
pieces. SO that all the waste might
be saved.
Several parts of the shoe are often
cut in one place and sent to another
place to be assembled. The estab-
lishment here does the cutting for
score or more factories. and is now
shipping a carload of parts a day and
one carload Of uppers to each Of its
factories here and there over New
England. 1t ships out three carloads
OF heels every week. Each part of
the shoe has its own price. and the
quartermaster general buys parts for
the Army shoes. 1 have a lst of
awards made not long ago to certain
leather companies which make parts.
Among them are 100000 half soles.
over 100000 marching top-lifts and
hundreds of thousands Of other parts,
EACH costing from to IS cents ac-
cording to the part of the shoe for
which 1t is used.
The shoes for the soldiers are sewed
shoes. They are the type known as
the Goodyear welt, the parts being
sewed by the Goodyear welt sewing
machine. Three different soles are
sewed together and the uppers are.
pulled over and sewed to the soIes by
a complicated machine that works as
though 1t had human fingers and, you
mieht almost say. a hnmRn brain
Machines here do all the work that
the cobblers Of the past did by hand.
The leather is rolled by machinery
and shaved to the right thickness be-
fore the dies are used This rolling
takes the place Of the lap stone Of the
cobbier. The shoes are lasted by ma
chinery. and the heels, after they are
nailed on in, the rough. are trimmed
into shape and finished by revolving
knives which VIII trim 1900 pairs Of
heels In day. BY the welt machine
one man can sew 500 pairs Of shoes
In day. The old cobbler could not
do fifteen pairs in that time. 1 saw
sofes. half inch thick sewed together
In eighteen seconds.
was interested in watching then,
put the nails into the heels. They al,
go in at one time, being pressed and
clinched by the machine. and that
with single movement of the hand
Of the operator. The old cobbIer had
10 drive each nail separately and he
clinched' 1t by pounding 1t against
a tool OF tough steel Very often the
clinching was not properly done and
the nail prodded the flesh of the
wearer.