The Stationary-Hook Chain Stitcher: A Vibrating Needle Lays Its Loop Over a Fixed Hook

"The pedestal of the frame bears in front the cloth-table, which is slotted, so as to allow a free passage and play of the needle, and is furnished with a stationary hook, M, screwed or otherwise permanently attached in such a position as to catch the thread from the needle when the latter is guided thereto by a projecting guide, N, for the purpose of forming the loop in the manner hereinafter described." "The loop is formed by the needle passing the thread over the crochet-point, where it remains until the needle, in its next downward motion, passes through the loop and draws it off the hook."

**Frame.** Screw a hardwood upright to a baseboard, clamp the baseboard to a table's edge as Gibbs did, and fix a hardwood cloth table across the front with a slot for the needle. **Rocking shaft and needle-head.** Run a steel rod through the upright as the rocking shaft, bent at its front end, and pivot a hardwood needle-head on it. Bend a crank on the rod's back end and fit a handle. Set a sewing machine needle, or a stout sewing needle with its eye near the point, in the head. **Hook.** Under the table beside the slot, screw a crochet hook with its point toward the needle's path and file a small inclined plane in front of it that guides the needle's thread over the point. **Feed and clamp.** Hold the cloth under a spring clamp and move it one stitch by hand each turn, in place of Gibbs's feeding hook. **Test.** Thread the needle, turn the crank slowly and watch each loop catch on the hook and the next pass through it. Sew 10 cm of chain seam in cotton fabric, then pull its end and see it unravel, as a chain stitch does.

**James E. A. Gibbs** of Mill Point, Pocahontas County, Virginia, received US 16,434, dated 20 January 1857. His cam F on the crank struck a roller G to raise the cloth clamp, a spring K kept the needle-head against its guides, a screw L limited the needle's swing to set the stitch length, and a bobbin with a spiral spring gave the thread its tension. His claim is making the chain stitch with a vibrating needle in combination with a stationary hook. **Honest limits.** A hand-built wooden demonstrator with hand feed stands in for his machine, and it is slow. The notebook's thread length is a rough rule; its values are examples. Your seam is the result.