Then, from an old spinning-wheel which he found in the attic of the house, he made a machine that sawed wood and saved labor in the cabinet-shop. He also constructed other machines out of wood, and the cleverness with which they were fashioned and adapted to the needs of the little shop enabled him and his grandfather to turn out an increased amount of work. At sixteen years of age it became necessary for young Pitkin to choose some trade, and he selected that of machinist. He was regularly indentured for three years, and received sixty cents a day for the first year, ninety cents a day for the second, and one dollar and twenty-five cents a day for the third. His father was disabled by ill health during this period, and the greater part of the son's meager earnings went to help support the family. Economy and Hard Study. All this time he was forced to live on a few cents a day, and the only money he spent besides the cost of his board and clothing was what went for books on mechanics and material for mechanical drawing. When his apprenticeship was finished he was not only a thorough machinist, but he was also a mechanical draftsman. His next position was in the locomotive repair-shops of the Cleveland, Akron and Columbus Railroad. The year he spent here was one of hard work and hard study, for he continued his drawing more assiduously than before. At the end of the year he obtained a place in the drawing department of the Baldwin Locomotive Works, having prepared himself for the stiff examination given there without one bit of outside assistance. He spent five years with the Baldwin company, worked up from the lowest position in the drawing department to the highest, and during that five years he introduced nearly one hundred improvements in locomotive construction. The training he had received in a small machine-shop was repaying him with interest, and his determination to make machines do as much work as possible was bearing fruit. Wherever he could, he introduced automatic machines. He was only twenty-five years old when he was promoted to the position of chief draftsman in the Rhode Island Locomotive Works. "Rather a responsible position for a young man," one of his friends suggested dubiously. "Not if the young man knows his business," replied Pitkin. "And I think I do. I've thought of nothing else for the last nine years." Became Superintendent. After two years in Providence, he went to the Schenectady Locomotive Works, and in two years he became superintendent of the shops. Here he was free to put into operation many of the ideas he could not use before, while he was working in subordinate positions, and it was largely due to him that the Schenectady company became one of the most prosperous in the country.