WEBVTT - Jan Ernst Matzeliger 0:00:01.320 --> 0:00:04.280 Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class, a production 0:00:04.400 --> 0:00:13.960 of iHeartRadio. Hello, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Holly 0:00:14.040 --> 0:00:17.400 Frye and I'm Tracy V. Wilson. The shoes that you're 0:00:17.440 --> 0:00:20.880 wearing today likely were made possible by an invention from 0:00:20.920 --> 0:00:25.239 the late nineteenth century, unless you're wearing like ballet slippers 0:00:25.480 --> 0:00:31.920 or very fancy handmade shoes, right, or something that doesn't 0:00:31.960 --> 0:00:35.680 have like an upper and a soul, which I suppose 0:00:35.760 --> 0:00:40.000 is possible if you're a medieval reenactor, or there are 0:00:40.000 --> 0:00:42.800 other outlier cases. But the thing is, most of us 0:00:42.840 --> 0:00:46.320 are wearing shoes that are made possible by this inventor 0:00:46.360 --> 0:00:49.760 from the late nineteenth century. And that inventor of the 0:00:49.800 --> 0:00:53.840 machine that made that possible had little to no formal education, 0:00:53.960 --> 0:00:56.040 and he didn't really get to enjoy the fruits of 0:00:56.040 --> 0:00:59.400 his labor. And he's one of those people that unless 0:00:59.400 --> 0:01:02.720 you're a shoe person, you might not know about. So 0:01:02.760 --> 0:01:07.880 we're talking about jan Ernst Matzalaiger today. Jan Ernst Matzelager 0:01:08.160 --> 0:01:11.759 was born on September fifteenth, eighteen fifty two, in the 0:01:11.760 --> 0:01:15.800 city of Paramaribo in Dutch Guiana in South America. So 0:01:15.920 --> 0:01:19.960 today that is in Surinam, and this city is its capital. 0:01:20.840 --> 0:01:24.520 Jan's father was Dutch and his mother was a Serenemese 0:01:24.600 --> 0:01:28.520 black woman. Several but not all, sources note that his 0:01:28.600 --> 0:01:33.000 mother was enslaved to his father. Jan's father was in 0:01:33.160 --> 0:01:35.880 Dutch Guiana at the behest of the Dutch government. He 0:01:36.000 --> 0:01:38.679 was an engineer and his job there was to manage 0:01:38.760 --> 0:01:43.399 various business interests and especially factories controlled by the government 0:01:43.440 --> 0:01:47.960 that ran heavy machinery. Jan lived with an aunt on 0:01:48.040 --> 0:01:51.600 his father's side of the family, starting at age three. 0:01:51.720 --> 0:01:54.920 There are a lot of biographical sketches of Yon that 0:01:55.000 --> 0:01:57.960 say that he would occasionally make the rounds of factories 0:01:58.000 --> 0:02:00.560 with his father as a child, and that he was 0:02:00.680 --> 0:02:03.840 drawn to the various pieces of machinery he saw, which 0:02:03.920 --> 0:02:07.280 kind of makes it sound sort of idyllic. He was 0:02:07.320 --> 0:02:09.360 in those factories at a very young age, but the 0:02:09.400 --> 0:02:12.040 reality was that was because he was put to work 0:02:12.120 --> 0:02:16.520 at age ten apprenticing for a machinist. He is said 0:02:16.520 --> 0:02:19.800 to have shown a lot of intuitive engineering skill from 0:02:19.800 --> 0:02:22.519 a very young age, and he was able to repair 0:02:22.639 --> 0:02:26.280 machinery he wasn't all that familiar with with very little instruction. 0:02:27.080 --> 0:02:30.359 When he was nineteen, Jan left Dutch Guiana by getting 0:02:30.400 --> 0:02:34.320 work on an East India merchant ship. For two years, 0:02:34.360 --> 0:02:36.919 he worked on the ship and he traveled, but when 0:02:36.960 --> 0:02:39.880 he arrived in Philadelphia, he decided to stay there for 0:02:39.919 --> 0:02:42.720 a while. It's believed that he spent some time in 0:02:42.720 --> 0:02:46.600 Philadelphia as a cobbler before moving on to Boston, and 0:02:46.639 --> 0:02:50.640 then in eighteen seventy three, Mattzlagger arrived in Lynn, Massachusetts, 0:02:50.800 --> 0:02:52.519 where he would live for the rest of his life. 0:02:53.440 --> 0:02:56.520 When Matzlagger arrived in Lynn, it had a population of 0:02:56.560 --> 0:02:59.000 about thirty five thousand and it was one of the 0:02:59.040 --> 0:03:02.760 main places in the United States where shoes were made, 0:03:03.520 --> 0:03:07.160 so eventually he found work in a shoe factory. He 0:03:07.200 --> 0:03:09.760 worked in a number of roles in the factory, starting 0:03:09.800 --> 0:03:12.799 on a soul sewing machine and then a heel burnisher, 0:03:12.880 --> 0:03:17.320 and then eventually onto a buttonhole machine, probably others as well, 0:03:17.400 --> 0:03:21.160 and to supplement his factory income, he also drove a coach. 0:03:22.280 --> 0:03:25.359 During those early years in the United States, Yan had 0:03:25.360 --> 0:03:29.880 to learn English and to recognize the restrictions that racism 0:03:30.040 --> 0:03:33.800 placed on his movements. One story from his time early 0:03:33.840 --> 0:03:36.000 on is that he tried to go to a church, 0:03:36.200 --> 0:03:38.520 but he was turned away from that church because he 0:03:38.600 --> 0:03:41.840 was black. He did eventually find a church, which was 0:03:41.920 --> 0:03:45.400 the North Congregational Church, and a community there in their 0:03:45.480 --> 0:03:49.040 Christian Endeavor Society, which was a youth group. Yeah, that 0:03:49.120 --> 0:03:52.840 church became very important to his life. In addition to 0:03:52.960 --> 0:03:56.240 driving a coach in his off hours, Yon also started 0:03:56.320 --> 0:03:59.960 formally studying English at evening classes several nights a week, 0:04:00.600 --> 0:04:04.120 and with these structured lessons, he soon progressed really quickly. 0:04:04.280 --> 0:04:07.160 And it said that he not only learned to read 0:04:07.240 --> 0:04:10.440 and speak English, but that when he spoke, he had 0:04:10.480 --> 0:04:14.600 no perceivable accent. And as his English improved, he became 0:04:14.680 --> 0:04:17.719 more and more involved in his church. He started teaching 0:04:17.800 --> 0:04:21.760 Sunday school and serving on various committees, and he also 0:04:21.839 --> 0:04:24.520 settled into life in the Greater Lynn community, and he 0:04:24.600 --> 0:04:27.360 soon built up this reputation as a gentleman with a 0:04:27.480 --> 0:04:30.479 very keen wit and a lot of kindness for others. 0:04:31.240 --> 0:04:34.320 Once Jan was proficient in English, he kept working to 0:04:34.440 --> 0:04:38.640 expand his education. He started acquiring all kinds of books, 0:04:38.760 --> 0:04:44.200 particularly scientific works. He learned about natural sciences and physics, 0:04:44.640 --> 0:04:49.039 and soon he started tinkering with various inventions. It's possible 0:04:49.080 --> 0:04:52.080 that some of these were successful and were eventually patented, 0:04:52.240 --> 0:04:56.320 but those patents would have been held by Matzlagger's employers. 0:04:56.920 --> 0:05:00.200 They helped him pay for the supplies that he needed. Y. Yeah, 0:05:00.200 --> 0:05:04.360 there's a lot of variation on what you will find 0:05:04.400 --> 0:05:07.480 in terms of what people think he invented during that time, 0:05:07.520 --> 0:05:12.360 which surely I did not include them because it's all speculation. 0:05:13.839 --> 0:05:17.240 But whatever he may have done in his early inventiveness, 0:05:17.320 --> 0:05:20.040 it was his work in shoe manufacturing that was the 0:05:20.040 --> 0:05:23.599 most important. And this reveals an interesting state in the 0:05:23.640 --> 0:05:26.200 manufacture of shoes that had been the case for a 0:05:26.320 --> 0:05:31.240 very long time. There were mechanized processes for just about 0:05:31.279 --> 0:05:36.040 every step of shoe manufacture by the mid nineteenth century, 0:05:36.080 --> 0:05:40.160 with the exception of the step known as lasting. So 0:05:40.440 --> 0:05:43.520 lasting is the stage of construction when the stitch together 0:05:43.800 --> 0:05:46.960 and more or less completed upper is shaped into its 0:05:47.000 --> 0:05:50.560 final form and then joined to the soul. And in 0:05:50.600 --> 0:05:53.440 the early half of the nineteenth centuries, machines had been 0:05:53.440 --> 0:05:56.480 developed they could handle literally all of the other steps, 0:05:56.839 --> 0:05:59.800 and Mattzalager was familiar with all of those machines because 0:05:59.839 --> 0:06:02.120 he worked on most, if not all, of the available 0:06:02.200 --> 0:06:05.279 ones of the factory. But no one had been able 0:06:05.360 --> 0:06:09.520 to mechanize lasting. There are some good reasons for that. 0:06:10.120 --> 0:06:13.200 You may have heard the term shoe last as a noun. 0:06:13.600 --> 0:06:16.360 That's the form often made of wood that is made 0:06:16.400 --> 0:06:20.120 to mimic the shape of a human foot, and it's 0:06:20.120 --> 0:06:23.720 what the finished upper is stretched over and formed on 0:06:23.800 --> 0:06:26.200 so that when you put the shoe on, it fits correctly. 0:06:27.080 --> 0:06:30.240 Lasts are still part of shoe manufacture. If you've ever 0:06:30.360 --> 0:06:33.720 wondered why some brands of shoes usually fit you better 0:06:33.760 --> 0:06:37.000 than other ones, it's because different companies use different lasts. 0:06:37.680 --> 0:06:41.120 With all the variations in foot shapes that humans have, 0:06:41.320 --> 0:06:43.600 some of them will match up to any given person's 0:06:43.600 --> 0:06:47.560 foot better than the others. This is also why sometimes 0:06:47.839 --> 0:06:50.000 a shoe you've been wearing for years can betray you 0:06:50.200 --> 0:06:53.120 because a new last has been selected to form an 0:06:53.160 --> 0:06:56.480 on right. If you buy the newest model, it may 0:06:56.520 --> 0:06:59.000 not be the same last as the old one, just 0:06:59.040 --> 0:07:02.719 as in a side that like. You can still have 0:07:03.839 --> 0:07:07.080 custom shoes made with a custom last sure where they 0:07:07.120 --> 0:07:10.120 will cast your foot and you get shoes that are 0:07:10.120 --> 0:07:12.880 made specifically just for you. And there was a lot 0:07:12.920 --> 0:07:16.360 of that going on in the nineteenth century when Mattzlagger 0:07:16.480 --> 0:07:20.560 was working, but he was focused on the industrial production 0:07:20.640 --> 0:07:24.640 of shoes. So in the eighteen seventies, when mattz Lagger 0:07:24.720 --> 0:07:29.320 started working in these shoe factories, skilled cobblers were still 0:07:29.320 --> 0:07:31.840 the ones to fit the upper of a shoe over 0:07:31.880 --> 0:07:35.200 the last, carefully shape it to that form, and then 0:07:35.280 --> 0:07:38.800 attach it to the sole with nails. And that human 0:07:38.840 --> 0:07:42.120 finishing was kind of a necessity because leather, which is 0:07:42.120 --> 0:07:45.120 what the vast majority of shoes were made from, has 0:07:45.280 --> 0:07:49.800 natural variables in it. Even two cuts of leather taken 0:07:49.840 --> 0:07:52.760 from the exact same animal hide and treated with the 0:07:52.880 --> 0:07:57.360 exact same processes might have different thicknesses, or may have 0:07:57.400 --> 0:08:01.600 different tendencies in different spots when it to stretch in flexibility. 0:08:02.520 --> 0:08:05.280 In addition to the careful shaping that had to be 0:08:05.320 --> 0:08:09.040 done taking these variables into account, the right and left 0:08:09.080 --> 0:08:12.360 shoe had to match perfectly, and they had to be 0:08:12.440 --> 0:08:16.040 perfectly joined to the soul. So there were plenty of 0:08:16.040 --> 0:08:18.360 people in the industry who really believed that there would 0:08:18.440 --> 0:08:20.960 always have to be a pair of human hands doing 0:08:21.000 --> 0:08:25.040 the finishing on shoes. But this also created a workflow 0:08:25.080 --> 0:08:27.280 problem because when all of those other parts of the 0:08:27.280 --> 0:08:31.160 process were mechanized, but the finish wasn't, that meant that 0:08:31.240 --> 0:08:33.600 shoe pieces would kind of pile up, and you had 0:08:33.600 --> 0:08:36.560 this bottleneck unless you had just a huge team of 0:08:36.600 --> 0:08:40.360 people who had the skill to handle lasting. We will 0:08:40.360 --> 0:08:43.920 talk about how manufacturers were trying to address this issue 0:08:44.200 --> 0:08:56.880 after we pause for a sponsor break. There were plenty 0:08:57.000 --> 0:08:59.080 of people trying to come up with a machine that 0:08:59.120 --> 0:09:02.400 could last shoe but there just wasn't anything working. By 0:09:02.440 --> 0:09:05.520 the time Matt Selager was in the industry, they had 0:09:05.559 --> 0:09:08.160 been trying for decades and the best that had come 0:09:08.200 --> 0:09:10.720 of it were kind of near misses or machines that 0:09:10.760 --> 0:09:13.240 could sort of do the job, but they weren't much 0:09:13.240 --> 0:09:15.880 faster than a manual finish, so there wasn't really a 0:09:15.880 --> 0:09:19.839 lot of impetus to adopt them. Gordon McKay, who was 0:09:19.880 --> 0:09:23.079 a businessman responsible for many of the machines in the industry, 0:09:23.520 --> 0:09:27.199 attempted to corner the lasting market by purchasing just about 0:09:27.240 --> 0:09:30.040 all of the existing patents that people had filed for 0:09:30.200 --> 0:09:32.600 various parts of it and kind of throwing a load 0:09:32.640 --> 0:09:36.000 of money at research and development. He was also very 0:09:36.080 --> 0:09:39.559 very ligitious with any competitors, but that wasn't really worth it, 0:09:39.640 --> 0:09:44.520 because while his efforts did eventually produce a lasting machine. 0:09:44.600 --> 0:09:47.760 It was only able to handle certain types of shoes, 0:09:48.240 --> 0:09:51.360 and the results even within that set of certain types 0:09:51.400 --> 0:09:55.840 of shoes were not consistent. And as these mechanization efforts 0:09:55.840 --> 0:09:59.720 were underway, the lasters in the industry unionized in eighteen eighty, 0:10:00.160 --> 0:10:02.240 and they were able to force the companies they worked 0:10:02.240 --> 0:10:05.760 for to give them significant pay increases because it had 0:10:05.760 --> 0:10:09.200 become deeply apparent that without them the whole system would 0:10:09.200 --> 0:10:14.640 fall apart. This unionization only spurred manufacturers to want a 0:10:14.720 --> 0:10:17.800 lasting machine so they could step around the last's union 0:10:18.080 --> 0:10:22.400 and its relatively high weekly salary arrangement. We say relatively 0:10:22.440 --> 0:10:25.840 because they were being paid what they deserved, but compared 0:10:25.880 --> 0:10:28.160 to other people in the industry, they were getting more. 0:10:29.080 --> 0:10:32.720 As Massachusetts and specifically Lynn were an epicenter of the 0:10:32.720 --> 0:10:35.880 shoe industry, Yon Matzalager had a front row seat to 0:10:35.920 --> 0:10:38.640 all of this playing out, and he thought that perhaps 0:10:38.760 --> 0:10:42.079 he could make a machine that could finish shoes. He 0:10:42.200 --> 0:10:45.080 started working through ideas for such a machine in the 0:10:45.120 --> 0:10:48.920 evenings when he wasn't working either of his jobs or 0:10:49.080 --> 0:10:52.240 seeing to any of his charch activities. He had to 0:10:52.240 --> 0:10:55.880 study mechanical engineering to even know where to start, and 0:10:56.040 --> 0:10:59.240 he acquired a set of drafting tools secondhand to start 0:10:59.240 --> 0:11:03.199 making diagrams. He didn't try to build on the previous 0:11:03.240 --> 0:11:07.880 efforts of other engineers because those were not working. Instead, 0:11:08.160 --> 0:11:10.600 he started by making a study of the people who 0:11:10.640 --> 0:11:14.240 were lasting shoes by hand. He observed them whenever he 0:11:14.280 --> 0:11:17.720 could and made detailed notes about how their hands moved 0:11:17.760 --> 0:11:21.480 through each step of the process. Six months later he 0:11:21.520 --> 0:11:26.199 had produced his first prototype. And this effort at making 0:11:26.200 --> 0:11:28.920 a prototype was really a case of making do with 0:11:29.040 --> 0:11:32.240 what he had on hand, because Mattzelager did not have 0:11:32.360 --> 0:11:36.600 much money, so he used discarded goods and made his 0:11:36.760 --> 0:11:40.880 prototype out of things like cigar boxes and wire offcuts 0:11:40.920 --> 0:11:42.920 that had been thrown away so that he could put 0:11:42.920 --> 0:11:46.280 it together. But this was really just a proof of concept. 0:11:46.360 --> 0:11:49.880 It was not intended to be a working piece of machinery. 0:11:49.960 --> 0:11:51.760 He just wanted to see if he had gotten the 0:11:51.800 --> 0:11:55.080 motions right before he attempted to build an iron version 0:11:55.200 --> 0:11:59.679 of his mechanism. Initially, he was as with his proof 0:11:59.679 --> 0:12:03.080 of com gathering cast off materials to try to make 0:12:03.120 --> 0:12:06.240 that iron version work. But then he had a stroke 0:12:06.280 --> 0:12:09.239 of luck when he was hired as a maintenance machinist 0:12:09.280 --> 0:12:13.040 for one of Lynn's Shoe manufacturers, and he was allowed 0:12:13.080 --> 0:12:15.800 to claim a small workspace in the plant there where 0:12:15.840 --> 0:12:18.880 he could work on his personal project and had access 0:12:18.920 --> 0:12:23.000 to some better materials. So there's some incongruity in the 0:12:23.040 --> 0:12:26.360 accounts in terms of whether people knew what he was 0:12:26.520 --> 0:12:30.199 up to, because we don't really have his own account. 0:12:30.400 --> 0:12:34.000 So these are secondhand versions that are often intended to 0:12:34.040 --> 0:12:37.720 frame the story in a particular way. Usually they involve 0:12:37.840 --> 0:12:42.080 people mocking him or secretly thinking he was a genius. 0:12:43.080 --> 0:12:46.960 One thing that's universally recognized was that Jon Matzlagger was 0:12:47.240 --> 0:12:51.080 driven in pursuit of this invention. Two women who worked 0:12:51.080 --> 0:12:53.720 with them at the factory realized that he was skipping 0:12:53.800 --> 0:12:56.480 meals to work on his project in this little space 0:12:56.520 --> 0:12:58.800 that he was in, and they started sharing their meals 0:12:58.880 --> 0:13:03.880 with him. He worked on getting this right for four years. Yeah, 0:13:03.880 --> 0:13:06.480 those two women became very good friends of his. He 0:13:07.920 --> 0:13:10.800 attended their weddings. They were like his work buddies, and 0:13:10.840 --> 0:13:12.560 they all took care of each other and it's very 0:13:12.640 --> 0:13:17.239 very sweet. But once he had a functioning model, Matzelager 0:13:17.320 --> 0:13:20.440 realized that he still needed money. The machine was more 0:13:20.559 --> 0:13:22.640 or less built, but there were other steps in the 0:13:22.679 --> 0:13:26.520 process that were going to need capital, like running tests 0:13:26.640 --> 0:13:29.680 with the machine and filing for a patent, and he 0:13:29.760 --> 0:13:32.800 reached out to potential investors, but most of them just 0:13:32.880 --> 0:13:36.079 wanted to purchase his ideas, or in some cases they 0:13:36.080 --> 0:13:39.000 wanted to purchase just parts of his machine, and he 0:13:39.120 --> 0:13:43.160 was not interested in either of those outcomes. Eventually, he 0:13:43.200 --> 0:13:46.600 did find financing in the form of a business partnership. 0:13:47.120 --> 0:13:51.360 Two men, Charles H. Delnow and Melville C. Nichols, offered 0:13:51.400 --> 0:13:55.199 to finance and start a company with Mattzlager in exchange 0:13:55.240 --> 0:13:59.160 for a three way split of the profits. Thanks to 0:13:59.200 --> 0:14:03.280 their investment, Yan was able to complete his patent application. 0:14:03.880 --> 0:14:08.040 The patent application was submitted January twenty fourth, eighteen eighty two, 0:14:08.679 --> 0:14:12.120 and it read, in part quote, heretofore devices have been 0:14:12.160 --> 0:14:16.360 contrived for performing a part of the operation, such as 0:14:16.480 --> 0:14:19.720 holding the last in proper position and drawing the leather 0:14:19.920 --> 0:14:23.320 over the last, while the nailing was done by hand. 0:14:24.040 --> 0:14:27.200 In my machine, I perform all the operations by the 0:14:27.240 --> 0:14:31.160 machine and automatically, requiring only the service of a boy 0:14:31.360 --> 0:14:35.400 or girl or unskilled labor to attend the machine. My 0:14:35.520 --> 0:14:39.000 invention includes a mechanism for holding the last in place 0:14:39.040 --> 0:14:41.920 and allowing it to be turned and the last fed 0:14:42.120 --> 0:14:46.080 forward in proper position for the operation of the machine. 0:14:46.160 --> 0:14:49.600 It includes a feeding device for moving the last step 0:14:49.640 --> 0:14:53.640 by step at a proper distance, whereby the mechanism for 0:14:53.840 --> 0:14:58.280 drawing over the leather may operate successfully and at proper intervals. 0:14:58.840 --> 0:15:02.600 It includes pincher or gripping mechanism for drawing the upper 0:15:02.760 --> 0:15:06.680 over the last, mechanism for turning the gripping mechanism in 0:15:06.800 --> 0:15:09.240 order to plat the leather at the heel or toe, 0:15:10.000 --> 0:15:13.680 mechanism for holding the last in proper position for the 0:15:13.720 --> 0:15:17.960 operation of the feeding mechanism, mechanism for feeding the nails 0:15:18.000 --> 0:15:21.120 and holding them in proper position to be driven, and 0:15:21.280 --> 0:15:25.480 mechanism for driving the nails at the proper instant. The 0:15:25.480 --> 0:15:28.880 details of construction are all fully set forth here and after, 0:15:29.040 --> 0:15:32.240 and together with the principles of my invention, are stated 0:15:32.400 --> 0:15:36.840 in the claims, so in case that slightly stilted language 0:15:36.840 --> 0:15:39.360 is unclear, the machine could pull the leather down over 0:15:39.400 --> 0:15:42.240 a last, plead it at the toe to fit around 0:15:42.240 --> 0:15:44.520 the last, and then it would grip the last with 0:15:44.560 --> 0:15:47.080 the leather upper on it while positioning it over the 0:15:47.120 --> 0:15:49.920 sole nail. The two of them together and then eject 0:15:50.000 --> 0:15:54.960 the shoe completed. But when he submitted this patent application 0:15:55.120 --> 0:15:59.040 in his documentation, it said that it kind of stumped 0:15:59.120 --> 0:16:02.840 officials at the US Patent Office. There wasn't anything wrong 0:16:02.880 --> 0:16:06.320 with the paperwork. It was just unique enough and complex 0:16:06.480 --> 0:16:08.960 enough that a patent official had to be sent to 0:16:09.040 --> 0:16:12.080 Lynn to inspect the machine himself to make sure he 0:16:12.200 --> 0:16:15.520 knew what Mattzalaiger had created before he approved it for 0:16:15.560 --> 0:16:19.040 a patent. So that excerpt that I made poor Tracy 0:16:19.120 --> 0:16:22.560 just read includes a lot of steps for one machine. 0:16:22.640 --> 0:16:26.479 So it may have seemed a bit unreal to patent experts. 0:16:26.800 --> 0:16:29.000 And that's particularly so when you consider that up to 0:16:29.040 --> 0:16:32.120 this point, the majority of people were like, no one 0:16:32.200 --> 0:16:34.400 is ever going to be able to invent a machine 0:16:34.440 --> 0:16:39.000 that does this. So this visit though to Lynn must 0:16:39.000 --> 0:16:41.920 have done the trick, because on March twentieth, eighteen eighty three, 0:16:42.440 --> 0:16:46.600 Mattzaliger received a patent for his invention. When I read this, 0:16:46.680 --> 0:16:48.360 I had a moment where I was like, this seems 0:16:48.440 --> 0:16:53.880 like more more effort to get the patents approved than 0:16:53.920 --> 0:16:55.960 a lot of the patents we have talked about. Yes, 0:16:56.040 --> 0:17:01.840 for sure, they were just like I'm sorry, what sir, Yeah. Next, 0:17:02.160 --> 0:17:05.000 there had to be factory tests to make sure that 0:17:05.040 --> 0:17:08.720 the machine laster worked. It took two years after the 0:17:08.760 --> 0:17:11.919 patent was granted for Matzlager to build a second model 0:17:12.040 --> 0:17:14.760 that would be ready for these kinds of tests, But 0:17:14.800 --> 0:17:17.680 at the end of May of eighteen eighty five, Mattzlager's 0:17:17.680 --> 0:17:21.120 invention was put through its paces. It turned out seventy 0:17:21.200 --> 0:17:26.280 five perfectly finished pairs of shoes. After the success, things 0:17:26.320 --> 0:17:29.560 moved very quickly, so quickly, in fact, that it gets 0:17:29.600 --> 0:17:32.600 hard to track the business deals that were made in 0:17:32.680 --> 0:17:36.080 the wake of this success. Beyond and his partners had 0:17:36.080 --> 0:17:39.320 formed a company, but they needed bigger investors so they 0:17:39.359 --> 0:17:42.480 could produce the machines at the scale that was needed 0:17:42.480 --> 0:17:47.560 to meet this instant market interest. Soon George W. Brown 0:17:47.760 --> 0:17:51.439 and Sydney W. Winslow were partners and the company was 0:17:51.520 --> 0:17:57.080 reorganized as the Consolidated Lasting Machine Company. Consolidated as a 0:17:57.119 --> 0:18:01.040 business owned the rights to Matzalauger's patent, and Matzelagger got 0:18:01.040 --> 0:18:05.760 a large chunk of the company stock. Consolidated Lasting Machine 0:18:05.760 --> 0:18:08.200 Company got up and running with the staff of two 0:18:08.320 --> 0:18:11.639 hundred and twenty five workers to build Lasting machines and 0:18:11.920 --> 0:18:16.600 very quickly demand to outpace their output, as is pretty 0:18:16.600 --> 0:18:21.679 common whenever there's a revolutionary invention, and Matzeliger's laster definitely 0:18:21.840 --> 0:18:26.920 was that. There were imitations. Many inventors sought to replicate 0:18:26.960 --> 0:18:30.520 the consolidated lasting machine, but nobody was really able to. 0:18:31.640 --> 0:18:33.560 One of the things that no one else seemed to 0:18:33.640 --> 0:18:36.600 ever get right was creating a machine that could complete 0:18:36.680 --> 0:18:40.480 all of the steps that Mattzaligers did while still handling 0:18:40.520 --> 0:18:44.719 the leather with care. Many of the imitation machines lost 0:18:44.840 --> 0:18:49.280 product due to tears and punctures in the material. At 0:18:49.320 --> 0:18:53.120 a time when the average number of pairs of shoes 0:18:53.240 --> 0:18:57.240 produced by an artisan laster working by hand was about 0:18:57.320 --> 0:19:01.119 fifty in a day, one of Matt's Laige's machines, working 0:19:01.160 --> 0:19:04.800 at its slowest, could make one hundred and fifty. That 0:19:04.920 --> 0:19:07.879 number was dependent on the style of the shoe and 0:19:07.960 --> 0:19:12.280 how fancy or intricate its design was. For simpler shoes, 0:19:12.520 --> 0:19:15.640 the machine could make as many as seven hundred pairs 0:19:15.640 --> 0:19:18.000 in a day, But of course this was not good 0:19:18.160 --> 0:19:20.840 news for the people who had been making their living 0:19:20.960 --> 0:19:25.280 as hand lasters. The rapid adoption of this machine by 0:19:25.320 --> 0:19:28.199 shoe manufacturers meant that there needed to be people to 0:19:28.280 --> 0:19:30.720 run them, and there was even a school set up 0:19:30.720 --> 0:19:34.680 by the consolidated Lasting Machine Company to train people. Many 0:19:34.800 --> 0:19:37.080 of the people that went through that training had been 0:19:37.320 --> 0:19:41.880 hand lasters, but you'll recall that mattz Lager's patent language 0:19:41.920 --> 0:19:44.520 specifically noted that a boy or a girl or an 0:19:44.600 --> 0:19:49.679 unskilled laborer could handle running the machine. That meant the 0:19:49.720 --> 0:19:53.280 factories felt like the wages for Lasting Machine operators could 0:19:53.320 --> 0:19:56.160 be a lot lower than what the lasters had been 0:19:56.240 --> 0:19:58.719 making when they were doing all that work by hand. 0:20:00.080 --> 0:20:04.120 The lasters were not against the use of Matzealiger's machine 0:20:04.760 --> 0:20:08.120 for those who transitioned from hand lasting to operating them. 0:20:08.640 --> 0:20:12.000 They recognized that their job was less strenuous, but they 0:20:12.000 --> 0:20:14.159 were against the way that it was being used to 0:20:14.400 --> 0:20:17.520 justify a reduction of their wages. In the middle of 0:20:17.520 --> 0:20:21.160 eighteen eighty seven, one factory W. L. Douglas Company had 0:20:21.160 --> 0:20:25.000 a strike. The lasters wanted an advance paid on the 0:20:25.000 --> 0:20:27.439 work they were doing, and they wanted an agreement in 0:20:27.520 --> 0:20:31.399 place that only union members would run the Lasting machines. 0:20:32.280 --> 0:20:34.760 This strike was reported in the Daily Item, which is 0:20:34.800 --> 0:20:38.040 the local paper for Lynn, on August eighth. It reads, 0:20:38.119 --> 0:20:41.600 quote the forty lasters employed at the factory of W. L. 0:20:41.680 --> 0:20:45.240 Douglas in Brockton quit work Saturday morning because of the 0:20:45.280 --> 0:20:49.800 disagreement between the lasters union and mister Douglas regarding the prices, 0:20:50.000 --> 0:20:53.040 and also because of two non union men being employed 0:20:53.080 --> 0:20:56.719 on the Lasting machines. Mister Douglas said that morning that 0:20:56.760 --> 0:20:59.320 the trouble was caused by the Lasting machines, which he 0:20:59.359 --> 0:21:03.080 had recently put into his factory. He said that last 0:21:03.119 --> 0:21:05.800 Monday he brought up from Plymouth two men to work 0:21:05.800 --> 0:21:08.520 on the machines, as he intended to put one half 0:21:08.600 --> 0:21:11.919 union and the other half non union men on the machines. 0:21:12.480 --> 0:21:15.200 The men were paid two dollars and fifty cents a day, 0:21:15.800 --> 0:21:18.720 which is about the same price they received for hand lasting. 0:21:19.240 --> 0:21:22.000 Mister Douglas states that he does not intend to allow 0:21:22.040 --> 0:21:26.080 the union to control the machines so as this write 0:21:26.160 --> 0:21:29.720 up continues, though, it reports that Douglas was actually planning 0:21:29.760 --> 0:21:33.159 to use only non union men going forward on the 0:21:33.240 --> 0:21:36.879 Lasting machines, but that he will still give handwork to 0:21:36.920 --> 0:21:41.000 anyone who wants it. That article states quote, all lasters 0:21:41.040 --> 0:21:43.240 who wish to return to work on Monday will be 0:21:43.240 --> 0:21:46.480 given employment, and all who do not return will consider 0:21:46.560 --> 0:21:50.359 themselves discharged. Those who do not return will never be 0:21:50.440 --> 0:21:53.919 employed again by him. Of course, if they came in, 0:21:54.119 --> 0:21:57.080 they would be paid at a lower rate. Though this 0:21:57.280 --> 0:22:01.600 was the first of several lasters strike in Lin and beyond, 0:22:02.280 --> 0:22:05.600 the messaging of the lasters Union always made clear that 0:22:05.640 --> 0:22:10.880 they weren't anti mechanization, They just wanted fair wages, and 0:22:11.000 --> 0:22:13.560 in a refreshing turn of events, they actually got them. 0:22:14.119 --> 0:22:17.400 The union managed to negotiate for the laster's pay to 0:22:17.400 --> 0:22:20.119 move back up to where it had been before the 0:22:20.200 --> 0:22:23.720 Lasting machine came into the factories, and for the machines 0:22:23.760 --> 0:22:27.840 to be run only by union members. Maybe even more 0:22:27.880 --> 0:22:31.399 surprising is that Yon Matzalager was never the target in 0:22:31.440 --> 0:22:34.920 any of these conflicts, and once the lasters were back 0:22:35.000 --> 0:22:37.640 at the factories running the machines, a lot of them 0:22:37.720 --> 0:22:41.000 noted that they were quite happy running them. Yeah, it 0:22:41.080 --> 0:22:44.640 was a lot less backbreaking than hunching over a pair 0:22:44.680 --> 0:22:47.120 of shoes and having to do that fifty times a day. 0:22:48.280 --> 0:22:50.400 In a moment, we're going to talk about what Yon 0:22:50.480 --> 0:22:53.240 Matzalaiger was up to while the Laster's Union and the 0:22:53.280 --> 0:22:56.920 factories were figuring out their conflict. But first, we will 0:22:56.920 --> 0:23:09.280 hear from the sponsors that keep the show going. While 0:23:09.320 --> 0:23:13.200 the strikes and union negotiations were playing out, Matzelager was 0:23:13.280 --> 0:23:17.320 still busy perfecting new iterations of the machine and coming 0:23:17.359 --> 0:23:21.479 up with completely new ideas. He became very interested in 0:23:21.560 --> 0:23:26.119 motors and perpetual motion machines. But though his curiosity and 0:23:26.359 --> 0:23:30.320 ingenuity were still running at full tilt, his health was failing. 0:23:31.240 --> 0:23:33.359 He had first come down with a cold in eighteen 0:23:33.400 --> 0:23:36.040 eighty six, but that cold never seemed to go away. 0:23:36.880 --> 0:23:39.920 He kept working through it, but he also just kept 0:23:39.960 --> 0:23:42.960 getting worse, and what he had thought was a persistent 0:23:43.000 --> 0:23:48.399 cold was eventually diagnosed as tuberculosis. Things progressed to a 0:23:48.440 --> 0:23:51.679 point that it really wasn't even feasible for Yan to 0:23:51.720 --> 0:23:55.280 live by himself. He had become really weak and eventually 0:23:55.440 --> 0:23:58.960 was too ill to even leave the house. He depended 0:23:59.000 --> 0:24:01.600 on his friends to take care of him, and he 0:24:01.680 --> 0:24:03.880 also took care of them. In a return. He purchased 0:24:03.880 --> 0:24:06.760 a home for his friends, mister and Missus William Lewis, 0:24:07.240 --> 0:24:10.159 and he lived there with them in his final years. 0:24:10.960 --> 0:24:13.119