Singer Foot pump sewing machine

[suds14]

Hi,

My mother recently had to go into assisted living due to complication from knee surgery. We are cleaning out the house and she had my great grandma's sewing machine in the basement. I do not have the room at my house to take it. I am posting pictures. The lid needs new hinges. I know by posting the sewing machine on this site, it will go to a good home and not get scrapped. My bothers are asking $50 or best offer. We are in the Pittsburgh PA area and the sewing machine would need to be picked up at her home. Please email me with any questions or offers.

Thanks

David
email address is in my profile

 

[tomturbomatic]

A treadle machine. Women used to give themselves orgasms using these according to a book I read.

 

For years, we had mom's treadle Singer in a very ugly tiger oak  cabinet.  The flywheel was amazing thing and we would play with the treadle and get it going really fast then let the flywheel  provide the momentum to keep the treadle going up and down untouched. 

 

[askolover]

Too bad I'm not closer because I'd take it.  I'd rather sew with my treadle any day over my new electric machines.  Lately the only time I get the new one out is to do a button hole since my treadle doesn't zig zag.  So many of these machines are getting destroyed by people using the treadles for tables and tossing the cabinets and machine heads.  I'd give anything to have my great-grandmother's old machine.  My mother gave it away when I was a teenager!

 

[ea56]

When my maternal grandparents got married in 1919, the first thing they bought was a Singer Treadle Sewing Machine. My grandma made all of her four daughters clothing on that Singer, every year, 5 new dresses with matching drawers for each girl. And she “took in sewing” by making clothing, doing alterations and mending for the people in town that couldn’t do this for themselves.

In 1935 when they were leaving Kansas for California, Grandpa told Grandma that there wasn't room in the little trailer he built for the move, to take the Singer. Grandma sat right down and said if the Singer didn’t go to California, neither would she. So, Grandpa found the room for it.

In the early 60’s when they downsized and moved into a mobile home my Mom got the Singer. I taught myself to sew on it. And when the leather belt that drove the treadle broke, I fashioned a makeshift belt by tying shoe laces together to make a belt, and by God, the Singer still worked this way. And there is no better machine for sewing through several layers of denim, they never bog down or refuse to do what they were designed to do.

If you are lucky enough to have one of these treasures, take good care of it, and it will never let you down.

Eddie

 

[kate1]

I love these old machines. My mother in law has one and it just can’t be beat. Whenever my little Kennore electric isn’t up to a task, I go use her treadle. If you want to make yourself sick, look up old sewing machine ‘upcycles’ and behold the horror. It’s sacrilege to destroy these machines the way people do, and to do it for a powder room sink console or an end table.

 

[lowefficiency]

>> If you want to make yourself sick, look up old sewing machine ‘upcycles’ and behold the horror.
>> It’s sacrilege to destroy these machines the way people do, and to do it for a powder room sink
>> console or an end table.

Don't take it that hard.

These sewing machines are a consumer product that sold in staggering quantities - many tens of millions of them were produced. While built to last and still up to the same tasks as when new, these machines are for most folks long considered obsolete as we as a society generally no longer make our own clothing. They were being trashed and scrapped with no concern for *decades* before Pinterest, Etsy, and the like gave them some value again. If anything, the horrors of their upcycling has made them more relevant as a cultural piece now than they were for the generation before, resulting in more of the remaining units being saved - at least in part.

I'm typing this from a computer desk built on - you guessed it - a cast iron treadle base, from a Domestic brand machine. I didn't take it apart - someone else did - and instead of rotting away in a dump, it's now living at least five or six new lives with different owners as its separate components.

But I still do all my sewing on a 1910 Singer Model 27, Sphinx motif.

 

[bradross]

I use my great-aunt's 1904 Singer...

refurbished it a few years ago, repainted the base and side logos, cleaned and oiled, etc. Works beautifully! Plus, it makes me feel very nostalgic when I used it - since it's been in the family so long.

 

[askolover]

I made a small drop-leaf table for my breakfast area from Tony's grandmother's treadle.  It was already dismantled...nothing but the iron base left...sitting outside rusting in the elements.  I cleaned it up, put rust neutralizer on it, and made the table top.  At least it won't disintegrate into a pile of iron dust now.  But that old National treadle I picked up in Nashville last year, I thought sure I'd have to pitch all the wood but the drawers were salvageable.  I just had to glue the oak veneer back in place and re-shellac everything.  I made simple new top from oak plywood and stained it to match.  The machine head was locked up so I replaced it with a 50's Japanese Singer 15 clone that sews like a dream.  I was later able to get the National freed up and got it to sew again too.  I'd give the machine head to someone if they wanted it to use because the hinge pins aren't set to the Singer standard and won't fit the top I made.