Civilization owes the invention of the sewing machine to Elias Howe, an American. Howe was born at Spencer, Massachusetts, July 9, 1819. His father was a miller, and work in the mills gave the son's mind a bent toward machinery. One day in 1839 while Howe was working in a machine-shop in Boston, he overheard a conversation among some men regarding the invention of a knitting machine. "What are you bothering yourselves with a knitting machine for? Why don't you make a sewing machine?" asked one. "I wish I could," was the reply, "but it can't be done." "Oh, yes it can," said the first, "I can make a sewing machine myself." "Well, you do it," replied the second, "and I'll insure you an independent fortune." This conversation impressed Howe with the idea of producing a sewing machine. The hope of relieving his extreme poverty set him to work on the invention in earnest in the year 1843. George Fisher, a coal and wood dealer of Cambridge, Massachusetts, who was a former schoolmate of Howe, formed a partnership with him for producing the invention. In December, 1844, Howe moved into Fisher's house, set up his shop in the garret, and went to work. In the following April he sewed the first seam with his new machine, and by the middle of May he had sewed all the seams of two suits of clothes, one for himself and one for his partner. On September 10, 1846, a patent on the sewing machine was issued to Howe from the United States Patent Office at Washington. The tailors of Boston, believing that a sewing machine would destroy their business, waged fierce warfare against it. In the spring of 1846, seeing no prospect of revenue from his invention, Howe took employment as a railroad engineer on one of the roads entering Boston, but this labor proved too hard for him and he soon gave it up. Howe's partner, Fisher, could see no profit in the machine and became wholly discouraged. Howe then determined to try to market his invention in England, and sent a machine to London. An English machinist examined it, approved it, and paid $250 for it, together with the right to use as many others in his own business as he might desire. Howe was afterward of the opinion that the investment of this $250 by the English machinist brought ultimately to that man a profit of one million dollars. [Illustration: ELIAS HOWE]