I have a hemstitcher

Ghods help us, I have a hemstitcher.

For years, my mother has been gradually clearing out the barn at her parents’ house.  (This clearing goes on although she sold the house several years ago.  That’s how things go in a small town.)  The barn was full of my grandparents’ household goods that never got moved back in after my grandfather “remodeled” the house in 1970.  Lots of it is ruined, some isn’t, some is on the edge.

One that is on the edge is a Singer model 72w-19 dual-needle hemstitcher, S/N W538319.  Singer’s lost their records for the W series, and will only say “after 1911.” I’m guessing it was made before 1930.  The model 72w had a LONG production run.  Mother, who was born in late 1932, says she “can’t ever remember not having it.”  C got to poking around on the Net well before I got into the act, and found that working examples sell for $2,000 and better, mainly because they’re industrial machines, built to last forever and then make you a pair of pants afterward.

C and Mother got to dickering back and forth about whether they should try to do anything with it—sell it to someone as is, try to have it fixed, haul it to the dump in despair.  On being asked my opinion, I consulted Piroshki, who sounded fairly encouraging about it provided it wasn’t a solid mass of rust.  Mother and C kept dithering at each other in email and cc:ing me but without ever asking me anything directly, “should we bring it to Sam?  Should we junk it rather than wish it on him?” &c. &c. until I finally told them both “Just bring the goddamn thing down here and let me worry about what happens to it after!  I’m quite old enough to make that decision for myself, and if it needs to go to the dump I can arrange to get it there—but I WANT TO SEE IT FIRST!!” which drew a hurt-sounding “we were only thinking about you” email from Mother.  The hell with that.  I get pissed off when I think they’re trying to talk over my head as though I was M.

Finally Mother stopped by last weekend on her way home from a scholarly society meeting, and dropped it off with us.  Now, at least, I know what I have.

The machine’s in rough condition.  It’s sat in a dirt-floored barn with no climate control for more than 35 years.  The paint on the bed is chipping (not on the body, though), rust has eaten through much of the nickel plating, the whole head’s COVERED in a thick layer of dust and dirt.  For a miracle, the mechanism might not be completely frozen up; I haven’t had a chance to fool with it.  Penetrating oil is gonna be my friend.

The power cord (cloth-covered) is completely rotted through.  My brother cut through the (original cloth-covered) wiring from the power switch (original) to the 1/5-horse Singer motor (probably original).  Barring a miracle, the motor would have to be completely rewound anyway.  The leather drive belt is perished, of course.

Paint on the irons is astonishingly good.  The table, a one-inch-thick hardwood laminate of some kind, is also covered in dirt and delaminating on one corner; I think THAT is probably fixable with care, soapy water, beeswax, and hide glue.

Even taken to bits, it weighs a motherfrelling TON, especially the table.  I strained one wrist carrying that in.  Pictures will follow once I can get my camera in order.

ETA: L made the sensible suggestion that it might have originally belonged to my great-grandmother.  That’s certainly possible.  She was VERY good at all kinds of domestic arts, and it wouldn’t surprise me if she “took in sewing” to supplement the income from her boarders, and bought it for that.  It would have been a big investment for her; in 1914 one of these combination treadle/motorized machines sold for more than $150.

Stitch, stitch here, stitch, stitch there.  Fnord.