The Barre daily times. (Barre, Vt.) 1897-1959, 1920-05-27
ANNUAL PIN OUTPUT l4,ooo,ooo,ooo.
Crop, With Needles, Is Worth $13,o0o,-

UUU.
Judging by the stupendous number
OF pins and hairpins manufactured in
this country every year, the task of the
fair sex in keeping up their browning
glory and pinning their clothing to-
gether must be something terrific.
Also, according to the number of nee
dies manufactured each year, the
American sewing must be some job
Fourteen billion toilet pins are pro-
duced by American factories annually.
American mothers find it necessary
to purchase 720.000,000 safety pins
every year in order to keep the blessed
little Riddles property harnessed.
The yearly crop of metal hairpins is
l,250O00, 900.
Needles of all kinds aggregate 1885,,
100000 every II months.
The value of this pin and needle crop
is Sl3,000,000 at the factories
There are 40 factories engaged i'll the
making of these articles, the total CAPT
talization being Sg,424,000.
Back in 1850 there were only four
pin factories in the United States. They
had combined capital Of $4,000 1t
will thus be seen that the growth %
this industry has been tremendous.
Thorns and fish bones were used as u
means of fastening clothing long before
the discovery Of pins and needles and
thread. Among the remains of the lake
jewellers of central Europe have been
found great number of pins-some of
bone, others of bronze. Some of them
are quite fancy, having ornamental
heads, while others are very crude.
Some have double stems, and a few
have been found that were made exact
ly like the safety pins of to-day
Among Egyptian and Greek ruins have
been found many specimens of artisti-
eally made pins. Ancient Roman bronze
pins and bone hairpins, with fancy
heads, have been found at Pompeii.
Pins for the use of the toilet were
first made in England during the 18th
century They were made of iron wire.
Brass wire pins were introduced from
France in 1910 by Catherine Howard,
Queen of Henry VIII The foundation
for the manufacture of the present day
pin commenced with the invention of
the process Of drawing wire. For many
years all pin manufacturing was con-
fined TO France and Germany, where
this process was invented. Brass wire
pins were first made in England in
1925. -
In the ear&4lays of the pin making
il was most tedious process. They
were made by filing a proper length of
wire to a point and then twisting a
fine piece of wire 10 the other end, thus
forming head This required IA diff
ferent operations by as many work
men all of which was done by hand, as
machinery had not been invented.
In IT'S the American Congress, rea
LIKING the absolute necessity for pins in
the development OF the civilization OF
the country, offered bonus of ESQ for
the first % dozen domestic pins equal
to those imported from England.
In 1907 Timothy Harris of England |
devised the first solid-headed pin,
American inventive genius, as usual. |
continued on the job until the best idea |
was hit upon. Lemuel Welman Wright, I
of this county, invented a machine in |
1924 which gave the industry much |
His machine made solid heads /
TO the pins by a process similar to the /
making Of nails, by driving a portion |
of a pin itself into a counter sunk |
hole This was done automatically.
Seven years later, in 1881, John Ire
land Howe, doctor in Bellevue hospi-
tai, New York, invented a machine for |
making perfect solidheaded pins. A
was organized and a factory |
started at Derby, Conn.
The modern automatic pin machine
the pin in all details except |
the coloring and polishing,
Samuel Slocum of Connecticut. in
vented the first pin sticking machine.
Dr. Howe utilized il in his factory in
ls4l. This machine is almost human in
its workings One workman feeds it |
with pins and another feeds it with
papers. The packages come out at the
other end of the machine exactly as the
ladies' buy them at the dry goods stores.
The Chinese were the first people in
the world to use steel needles. The Chi
nese needles slowly made their way
westward until they were brought into
Europe by the Moors.
The earliest needles known TO history
lid not have eyes, but were like avis,
md were used for making holes in the
,kins, through which long roots of
plants, or leather thongs were passed
ind then tied Later a hole was bored
through one end of the stone or bronze
ieedle, through which the root or
Gather was passed. and thus dragged
through the hides as punched. Such
lcedles are found in the remains OF the
tone age. Bone needles with eyes are
ound in the reindeer caves Of France
md the lake jewellers OF central Europe.
II was not until after 1885 that nee
les were made and finished entirely bx