Editing Elias Howe (section)

==Invention of sewing machine and career==
[[File:US-Patent4750-sewing machine.jpg|thumb|Howe's sewing machine]]
Howe was not the first to conceive of the idea of a sewing machine. Many other people had formulated the idea of such a machine before him, one as early as 1790, and some had even patented their designs and produced working machines, in one case at least 80 of them.<ref>{{cite web | url=http://www.ismacs.net/sewing_machine_history.html | title= A Brief History of the Sewing Machine | publisher= ISMACS International | access-date = May 22, 2010}}</ref> However, Howe originated significant refinements to the design concepts of his predecessors, and on September 10, 1846, he was awarded the first United States [[patent]] ({{US patent|4750}}) for a sewing machine using a [[lockstitch]] design. His machine contained the three essential features common to most modern machines: a needle with the eye at the point, a shuttle operating beneath the cloth to form the lock stitch, and an automatic feed.

A possibly apocryphal account of how he came up with the idea for placing the eye of the needle at the point is recorded in a family history of his mother's family:

{{blockquote|He almost beggared himself before he discovered where the eye of the needle of the sewing machine should be located. It is probable that there are very few people who know how it came about. His original idea was to follow the model of the ordinary needle, and have the eye at the heel. It never occurred to him that it should be placed near the point, and he might have failed altogether if he had not dreamed he was building a sewing machine for a savage king in a strange country. Just as in his actual working experience, he was perplexed about the needle's eye. He thought the king gave him twenty-four hours in which to complete the machine and make it sew.  If not finished in that time death was to be the punishment. Howe worked and worked, and puzzled, and finally gave it up. Then he thought he was taken out to be executed. He noticed that the warriors carried spears that were pierced near the head. Instantly came the solution of the difficulty, and while the inventor was begging for time, he awoke. It was 4 o'clock in the morning. He jumped out of bed, ran to his workshop, and by 9, a needle with an eye at the point had been crudely modeled. After that it was easy. That is the true story of an important incident in the invention of the sewing machine.<ref>{{cite book|last=Draper|first=Thomas Waln-Morgan|title=The Bemis History and Genealogy: Being an Account, in Greater Part, of the Descendants of Joseph Bemis of Watertown, Massachusetts|page=160|url=https://archive.org/details/bemishistorygene00drap/page/160/mode/2up|year=1900|publisher=San Francisco, Cal. [The Stanley-Taylor co., printer] }}</ref>}}

Despite securing his patent, Howe had considerable difficulty finding investors in the United States to finance production of his invention, so his elder brother Amasa Bemis Howe traveled to England in October 1846 to seek financing. Amasa was able to sell his first machine for £250 to William Thomas of [[Cheapside]], [[London]], who owned a factory for the manufacture of corsets, umbrellas and valises. Elias and his family joined Amasa in London in 1848, but after business disputes with Thomas and failing health of his wife, Howe returned nearly penniless to the United States. His wife Elizabeth, who preceded Elias back to the United States, died in Cambridge, Massachusetts shortly after his return in 1849.<ref>{{cite news | url= https://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9A0CEFD91731EF34BC4D53DFB667838C679FDE | title= Elias Howe Obituary | publisher= New York Times, October 5, 1867 | access-date= November 8, 2009 | date=October 5, 1867}}</ref>

Despite his efforts to sell his machine, other entrepreneurs began manufacturing sewing machines. Howe was forced to defend his patent in a court case that lasted from 1849 to 1854 because he found that [[Isaac Singer]] with cooperation from [[Walter Hunt (inventor)|Walter Hunt]] had perfected a facsimile of his machine and was selling it with the same lockstitch that Howe had invented and patented. He won the dispute and earned considerable [[royalties]] from Singer and others for sales of his invention.{{citation needed|date=July 2020}}

Howe contributed much of the money he earned to providing equipment for the [[17th Connecticut Infantry Regiment|17th Connecticut Volunteer Infantry]] of the Union Army during the [[United States Civil War|Civil War]], in which Howe served as a private in Company D. Due to his faltering health he performed light duty, often seen walking with the aid of his [[Shillelagh (club)|shillelagh]], and took on the position of Regimental Postmaster, serving out his time riding to and from Baltimore with war news. He'd enlisted August 14, 1862, and then mustered out July 19, 1865.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://home.att.net/~DogSgt/CoD.html |title=Muster roll, Company D, 17th Connecticut Volunteer Infantry Regiment |publisher=Seventeenth Connecticut Volunteer Infantry homepage |access-date=November 9, 2009 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080720001601/http://home.att.net/~DogSgt/CoD.html |archive-date=July 20, 2008 }}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.chs.org/ransom/008.htm|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071016073256/http://www.chs.org/ransom/008.htm|url-status=dead|title=Pro Patria: Civil War monument of Connecticut|archive-date=October 16, 2007}}</ref>