AN IMPROVEMENT IN THE MANU- FACTURE OF BOOTS AND SHOES AND OTHER ARTICLES OF LEATHER OR KINDRED "SUBSTANCES
Year: 1867

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to William Snell, of. 16, Clement's Inn, in the City of
Westminster, for the Invention of "AN IMPROVEMENT IN THE MANU-
FACTURE OF BOOTS AND SHOES AND OTHER ARTICLES OF LEATHER OR KINDRED
"SUBSTANCES."-A communication from abroad by Thomas Briggs Smith,
of the City of Boston, in the State of Massachusetts, and United States
Amanice
Sealed the 9th August 1867, and dated the 1st May 1867..
COMPLETE SPECIFICATION filed by the said William Snell at the Office
of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition and Declaration, on
the 1st May 1867, pursuant to the 9th Section of the Patent Law
Amendment Act, 1852..
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, WILLIAM
SNELL, of 16, Clement's Inn, in the City of Westminster, send greeting.
WHEREAS I am in possession of an Invention for "AN IMPROVEMENT IN THE
MANUFACTURE OF BOOTS AND SHOES AND OTHER ARTICLES OF LEATHER OR KINDRED
SUBSTANCES," and have petitioned Her Majesty to grant unto me, my executors,
administrators, and assigns, Her Royal Letters Patent for the same, and have
made solemn Declaration that the same is a communication from Thomas
Briggs Smith, of the City of Boston, in the State of Massachusetts and United.
States of America.
i

page_text: NOW KNOW YE, that I, the said William Snell, do hereby declare that
the following Complete Specification, under my hand and seal, fully describes
and ascertains the nature of the said Invention, and in what manner the same
is to be performed, in and by the following statement, taken in connection with
the accompanying Drawings, whereon Fig. 1 is a perspective view of a shoe
made with my improved pegs, the bottom of the sole being upwards to show
the position and appearance of the pegs when driven; Fig. 2 represents a
piece of hose, in which the seam is made with the improved peg; Fig. 3 is a
piece of the twisted wire from which the pegs are made; Fig. 4 is a strap of
belting, the lap of which is fastened by the improved peg; Figs. 5, 6, and 7
are details shewing various applications of the peg to the uniting of pieces of
leather. The same letter indicates the same part wherever it occurs.
The nature of this Invention consists in the formation from twisted,
polygonal, metallic wire, of a peg or fastener for attaching together - pieces of
leather, or of other kindred substances to which such a mode of fastening
may be applicable, said pegs being chiefly intended as a substitute for those
commonly employed in the pegging of boots and shoes...
The superior durability of a metallic fastening over pegs of wood is
sufficiently obvious, and the value of the screw in uniting leather in the
manufacture of boots and shoes has been recognized and demonstrated in
France, where it is employed in the ordinary form, each screw being driven
in by a screwdriver by hand labour and filed down even with the surface
of the leather. This method is very slow and expensive, and inapplicable
to the macbine pegging, which is now the prevailing mode of manufacture
in the United States; but the boots and shoes produced by it are greatly
superior in durability to those made in any other way.
It has been my aim in the present Invention to produce a peg, which shall
unite the advantages of the metallic, peg and the screw, and which is capable
of being driven in the ordinary way by machinery and by hand.
To cut a screw thread on a continuous length of wire, and afterwards cut it
into lengths for pegs was found too expensive for practical use, and it was to
overcome this difficulty that I devised the mode which is the subject of 'the
present application.
I obtain the effect of a sharp screw thread of any desired pitch 'by imparting
a twist of any desired degree to a polygonal wire; this I do by means of a
machine which have invented-for-the-purpose, but which forms no part of
the present Invention; the wire thus twisted is cut into the proper lengths for
pegs, and the pegs thus produced are found to be capable of use in the ordinary
pegging machines, as well as of being driven by hand in the usual way. Being

page_text: started in a hole prepared for it such a peg turns while it is being driven, and
holds the pieces which it unites together with the same tenacity as the
ordinary screw.
What I claim sa peg or fastening formed from twisted polygonal wire,
and applicable to the uniting of leather or other flexible materials, whether
woven, felted, or laid.
In witness whereof, I, the said William Snell, have hereunto set my
hand and seal, this Thirtieth day of April, in the year of our Lord One
thousand eight hundred and sixty-seven.
W. SNELL. (L.S.)