Elias toiled away in his machine shop trying to solve the problem that would make his contraption practical. He thought solving the problem would be quick and easy. Other inventors had tried but failed in the task that Elias struggled with. He worked day and night on the problem and was nearing the point of poverty. Even as he slept, the problem taunted him. Finally, his life depended on the success of his invention.
The king was a ruthless man who was feared by all. When people saw him, they averted their gaze so as not to attract his attention. If the king took notice of someone, it normally ended badly. Somehow, the king heard about Elias’s work on his invention. The king realized that Elias’s invention would put his country in the forefront in the Industrial Revolution, and it would also be a fun game. To Elias, it was no game. It was cruel. The king sent word to Elias that he had just 24 hours to make his invention work. If he failed to get it to work in that short length of time, the king would have Elias executed.
Elias worked at a feverish pace. At times, minutes felt like hours ,while at other times, hours felt like seconds. Elias was running out of time. With a knock on the door, Elias knew his time had run out. His mind frantically worked for a way to make his contraption work. The king’s lead soldier knocked with such force the second time that the door almost came off its hinges. Elias had no choice but to answer the door. The lead soldier glared at Elias. Several other soldiers waited in formation outside. The lead soldier asked Elias if he had finished with his invention. Elias knew better than to lie because the soldier would test the device and the outcome would be the same. Elias hung his head and explained that he had failed to make it work. He needed more time, time the king was unwilling to give. The soldiers shackled Elias’s hands and led him away to be executed. As they walked, none of the soldiers would speak to or even make eye contact with Elias. Elias’s pleas for more time were answered with silence. Elias looked at each soldier, then looked at each soldier’s weapon. In the front were soldiers carrying pikes, long wooden shafts with leaf-shaped steel spears attached to the ends. Elias noticed that the spear points had a small hole drilled near the tip. It was a eureka moment for Elias. In that instant, he knew how to make his contraption work. The one part of his contraption that he failed to make work just needed a hole similar to those in the soldiers’ pikes. He tried to explain this to the soldiers, but they kept marching Elias to the place of his execution. Elias kept trying to persuade the soldiers all the way to the scaffolding. As the soldiers held Elias’s head on the chopping block, Elias begged for them to reconsider. The executioner drew back his ax. As the blade of the ax fell, Elias jerked himself awake. It had all been a dream.
It was about 4 o’clock in the morning when Elias awoke in his bed in Massachusetts. There was no brutal king, no soldiers, and no execution. Then, Elias remembered the pierced tips of the pikes the soldiers carried. He ran to his shop and began working by candlelight. By nine o’clock that same morning, Elias had solved the problem that had stumped other inventors for decades. He tested his working model repeatedly with the expectation that it would soon fail, but it worked beautifully. On September 10, 1846, the United States Patent Office awarded Elias patent number 4,750, from which he became wealthy. Because of that dream, Elias knew where to position the eye in the needle. One newspaper reported that his machine makes “beautiful and strong seams in cloth as rapid as nine tailors!” That dream helped Elias Howe invent the first practical sewing machine.
Sources:
1. London Daily News, March 15, 1847, p.2.
2. The Boston Globe, March 25, 2018, p.K6.