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Speaker 1: Welcome to steph you missed in history class from how

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Speaker 1: Stuff Works dot Com. Hello, and welcome to the podcast.

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Speaker 1: I'm Holly Fry and I'm Trac B. Wilson. So you

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Speaker 1: probably know the name Isaac Singer because the Singer name

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Speaker 1: is still emblazoned on sewing machines available to all of

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Speaker 1: us today. But there is so much more to his

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Speaker 1: life story than that particular innovation. Uh. We mentioned when

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Speaker 1: we did our episode several years ago on the patent

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Speaker 1: Wars around the Sewing Machine that his life story was

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Speaker 1: sort of fascinating and merited its own episode, and he's

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Speaker 1: finally getting it. But I will tell you upfront he's

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Speaker 1: not really a heroic figure, although he has like a

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Speaker 1: hard scrabble start and you really want to root for him.

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Speaker 1: He also was a big fan of kind of shady

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Speaker 1: business dealings. He had a very violent temper, and there

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Speaker 1: are a whole lot of women and children in this story.

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Speaker 1: Singer was born on Octo eighteen eleven in Pittstown, New York.

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Speaker 1: His father, Adam Singer, was a German immigrant from Saxony.

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Speaker 1: The name Singer is shortened from the family named Rice Singer.

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Speaker 1: The change Adam made after arriving in the United States,

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Speaker 1: Adam and his wife, American born Ruth Benson, had seven

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Speaker 1: other children in addition to Isaac, and not long after

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Speaker 1: Isaac was born, the family moved to the township of

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Speaker 1: Granby and the relatively unpopulated Oswego County, and the family

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Speaker 1: was not wealthy. Adam Singer had worked as a millwright,

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Speaker 1: which was a job that required both technological skill and

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Speaker 1: some know how an ingenuity, but it was really an

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Speaker 1: underpaid field prior to unionization. But then when they moved

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Speaker 1: away from Pittstown and to Granby, that wasn't really a

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Speaker 1: job that was available. They were basically homesteaders by this point,

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Speaker 1: trying to tamy land that really was largely still wilderness.

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Speaker 1: As a side note, as we Go was in the

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Speaker 1: midst of an area that was really considered a theater

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Speaker 1: in the War of eighteen twelve. Although the residents of

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Speaker 1: that area seemed to have pretty much been onlookers rather

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Speaker 1: than active participants. They were not really strongly affected by

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Speaker 1: the war, even though it was part of the war. Theater. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: it was happening around them, but it seemed like it

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Speaker 1: didn't There were so few of them. For one thing

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Speaker 1: that it wasn't like, and the town was attacked because

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Speaker 1: there weren't really towns. It was very scattered, so Isaac,

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Speaker 1: for his part, had only a very basic education at

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Speaker 1: this point. The school where he learned was new um

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Speaker 1: It had been built by collecting money from families of

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Speaker 1: the area, and there's some suggestion from his own recollections

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Speaker 1: and interviews that he gave later in his life that

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Speaker 1: his father actually kept him away from school, and the

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Speaker 1: family home was generally characterized as pretty tumultuous. Adam and

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Speaker 1: Ruth did divorce in eight one, and as part of

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Speaker 1: coverture laws of the time him a woman lost all

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Speaker 1: claim to any property of their husbands if they petitioned

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Speaker 1: for divorce, and children fell under a similar provision, they

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Speaker 1: gave up rights to guardianship of their children, so Isaac

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Speaker 1: never saw his mother again after this point. Adam remarried

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Speaker 1: two years after the divorce, but Isaac never really bonded

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Speaker 1: with his stepmother, So just twelve years old, he left home.

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Speaker 1: He struck out for Rochester. It is possible, though kind

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Speaker 1: of unconfirmed, that he first stayed with an older brother.

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Speaker 1: Once he got there, he sought out of school to

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Speaker 1: attend and he spent most of the next seven years

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Speaker 1: trying to make up for his previous lack of education. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: and that that is sort of a really interesting aspect

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Speaker 1: of his story, Like he was not required to go

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Speaker 1: to school at this point. That was a voluntary school

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Speaker 1: attendance on his part, because he really did feel like

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Speaker 1: he would have rather been going to school throughout his childhood.

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Speaker 1: And when he was nineteen, Singer got a position as

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Speaker 1: a machinist's apprentice, and this seemed like he was on

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Speaker 1: track for a really stable career. This was actually considered

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Speaker 1: sort of cutting edge technology at the time, But this

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Speaker 1: apprenticeship only lasted four months. Singer would later claim that

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Speaker 1: in those four months he had learned all that a

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Speaker 1: normal apprentice would have learned in the customary seven years

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Speaker 1: of study with a master. But an entirely different interest

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Speaker 1: had grabbed the young man's attention, and that was acting.

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Speaker 1: He started taking odd jobs with the Rochester Theater, doing

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Speaker 1: everything from taking taking tickets to being a prop man,

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Speaker 1: all the while waiting to finally be cast in a play.

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Speaker 1: He did eventually earn some small parts and then the

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Speaker 1: lead role in Shakespeare's Richard the Third he would later

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Speaker 1: tell reporters that he was quote one of the best

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Speaker 1: richards of his day. He was not very modest, and

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Speaker 1: also the reviewers did not agree with him. No UH

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Speaker 1: and around this same time he met a young woman

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Speaker 1: named Catherine Maria Hailey, and Singer, who was nine teen

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Speaker 1: it's still at this point, married her in December of

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Speaker 1: eighteen thirty and he had the first of many children

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Speaker 1: just a few years later. But Singer was often gone.

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Speaker 1: He would travel to other towns for theater jobs, which

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Speaker 1: he held in addition to a day job that he

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Speaker 1: had at a dry goods store in the town of

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Speaker 1: Port Gibson, where they lived, but he was pretty half

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Speaker 1: hearted about his UH dedication to that regular job. In

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Speaker 1: eighteen thirty six, Isaac, Catherine, and the baby moved to

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Speaker 1: New York City. At the time, rumors were already swirling

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Speaker 1: in Port Gibson that Singer had come to know a

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Speaker 1: great many of the ladies there quite intimately. This is

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Speaker 1: the kind of rumor that will crop up over and

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Speaker 1: over in today's episode. UH. In New York, Isaac took

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Speaker 1: some odd jobs to make ends meet, and there were

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Speaker 1: once again, almost immediately rumors of his proclivity to be

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Speaker 1: unfaithful to his wife, but at this point he was

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Speaker 1: more concerned with pursuing his acting career or than he

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Speaker 1: was with his reputation. He joined a group called the

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Speaker 1: Baltimore Strolling Players in eighteen thirty six, once again taking

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Speaker 1: any jobs that he could until he could break into

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Speaker 1: acting roles with them. Was while performing with the Strolling

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Speaker 1: Players in Baltimore that Isaac met eighteen year old mary

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Speaker 1: Anne Sponslor, and it wasn't long before Singer proposed a sponsor,

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Speaker 1: and in autumn of eighteen thirty six, he moved her

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Speaker 1: to New York City. Imagine her surprise when she discovered

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Speaker 1: a wife and child in the mix. However, Singer was

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Speaker 1: a very smooth talker. He was apparently very charming with

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Speaker 1: the ladies, and he convinced his young love that his

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Speaker 1: marriage was all but over and that they should live

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Speaker 1: as husband and wife while he worked out his divorce

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Speaker 1: so that they could then be legally married. In the meantime,

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Speaker 1: Isaac and his actual wife Catherine had another child. Although

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Speaker 1: Isaac would continue his relationship with mary Anne Sponsler for

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Speaker 1: the next twenty four years, she was patient and he

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Speaker 1: was barely very very very charming and convincing, and they

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Speaker 1: had ten children together over that twenty four years. Unlike Sponsor,

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Speaker 1: though Catherine did not stick around. She took her two

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Speaker 1: kids and moved in with her parents. They're divorce didn't

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Speaker 1: actually happen for more than two decades, though, and though

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Speaker 1: he claimed to a dore Sponsor, Singer was not really

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Speaker 1: around for her either. Even as she was burying many

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Speaker 1: many children, he was once again traveling to find work,

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Speaker 1: sometimes at this point as a day laborer, and in

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Speaker 1: eighteen thirty nine, at the age of twenty eight, he

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Speaker 1: invented a rock drilling machine. This ended up sort of

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Speaker 1: designed for government use, and he filed a patent on it,

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Speaker 1: and he sold the rights to that patent for two

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Speaker 1: thousand dollars, which was a substantial amount of money at

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Speaker 1: the time. It seems like he used that money to

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Speaker 1: start a theater troupe called the Merit Players, and they

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Speaker 1: went on a national tour. Mary Anne and their first

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Speaker 1: son joined him on the road, and the family and

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Speaker 1: the rest of the troops spent eighteen thirty nine eighteen

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Speaker 1: forty four mostly in a wagon while they went from

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Speaker 1: town to town. Marianne and Isaac had three more children

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Speaker 1: during this period of constant travel. That sounds so miserable

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Speaker 1: to me, but what do I know. Singer, who performed

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Speaker 1: under the name Isaac Merritt during this time, finally ran

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Speaker 1: out of money and he had to shutter his theater

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Speaker 1: enterprise in eighteen forty four, out of money and done

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Speaker 1: with acting after trying and failing to earn a living

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Speaker 1: at it for fourteen years. At this point, Singer instead

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Speaker 1: picked up right where he left off career wise before

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Speaker 1: his stint on the stage, and he once again turned

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Speaker 1: to machine work. We will talk about his return to

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Speaker 1: working with machines in just a moment, but first we're

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Speaker 1: going to pause for a break word from sponsor. Singer

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Speaker 1: set up a shop in Pittsburgh in eighteen forty six

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Speaker 1: that made wood type letters and raised sign letters, and

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Speaker 1: a few years later, in eighteen forty nine, he patented

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Speaker 1: his second invention, and that was a wood and metal

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Speaker 1: carving machine. So this basically could make printing type for

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Speaker 1: in lettered blocks, and he decided to move to New

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Speaker 1: York City once again, this time with the intent to

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Speaker 1: set up shop as a manufacturer, and he established a

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Speaker 1: factory there to mass produce these carving devices. His family

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Speaker 1: suffered while he followed this dream. At this point, there

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Speaker 1: were six children, not enough money to cover expenses in

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Speaker 1: anything but the most bare way, and he persevered. Though

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Speaker 1: he did manage to set up a machine shop. But

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Speaker 1: this little factory was really short lived. A boiler explosion

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Speaker 1: destroyed the entire business, and sixty three people died when

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Speaker 1: that happened. While Singer himself survived because he was out

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Speaker 1: at the time of the explosion, he was destitute. He

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Speaker 1: eventually convinced George B. Zeeber, who was a publisher and bookseller,

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Speaker 1: to invest in his carving machine so he could build

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Speaker 1: another prototype to replace the one that had been destroyed

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Speaker 1: in the explosion. And just in the children tally, I

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Speaker 1: feel like I should mention that those six children were

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Speaker 1: the ones he had with Mary Anne. Catherine still had

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Speaker 1: the other two children elsewhere she was living, I believe,

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Speaker 1: with her family at the time. Uh and Singer had

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Speaker 1: to move his shop to Boston as part of his

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Speaker 1: agreement with Zeber, which he did, although his family stayed behind,

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Speaker 1: and in point of fact, it was actually both families

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Speaker 1: staying behind in New York City because by random happenstance,

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Speaker 1: his wife, Katherine, moved into the city and ended up

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Speaker 1: just a few blocks away from his home with Mary Anne.

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Speaker 1: Just to keep everything super awkward, well, nobody in the

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Speaker 1: publishing industry seemed really interested in Singers carving machine. Singer

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Speaker 1: and his partner were interested in something new that they

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Speaker 1: saw in the shop they had rented, and that was

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Speaker 1: sewing machines. Yeah, they had rented a little space in

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Speaker 1: this shop where they could kind of show off their

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Speaker 1: piece and have people come and visit and see it.

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Speaker 1: And also in this shop were lots of sewing machines.

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Speaker 1: So since his business was non existent, Isaac started examining

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Speaker 1: the various sewing machines that came into the shop, which

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Speaker 1: was owned by a man named Orson C. Phelps. And

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Speaker 1: as you may recall from our episode from several years

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Speaker 1: ago about the invention of the sewing machine, they were

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Speaker 1: still very very new at the time, and there was

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Speaker 1: not one basic approach to how they worked, but several.

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Speaker 1: So there were multiple different designs because numerous different entrepreneurs

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Speaker 1: were vying to establish themselves as the manufacturer of the

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Speaker 1: best sewing machine. There's some discrepancy in the accounts of

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Speaker 1: Singer and Phelps as to exactly how this situation sparked

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Speaker 1: Singers work on a new version of the sewing machine,

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Speaker 1: Phelps claims to have challenged Singer to come up with

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Speaker 1: a design, since he was quick to point out what

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Speaker 1: was faulty in all the models that he saw, but

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Speaker 1: Singer was initially not interested and pretty reluctant. Singer of

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Speaker 1: course left all that out when talking about his invention later. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: he definitely describes it much more as being really inspired

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Speaker 1: to fix the the problems of others. Uh. But in

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Speaker 1: the end, Singer, Zeeber, and Phelps did enter into a

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Speaker 1: partnership in which Phelps offered workspace, Zieber contributed financially, although

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Speaker 1: he was really quite strapped at this point, having put

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Speaker 1: a lot of money into this carving machine that they

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Speaker 1: were working on. Uh. And then Singer handled the design

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Speaker 1: in the building and it was less than two weeks,

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Speaker 1: only eleven days from when he had the idea and

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Speaker 1: figured out his design too when he had a first

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Speaker 1: model built. And so for clarity, sometimes when you read this,

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Speaker 1: it makes it sound like he just went off by

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Speaker 1: himself and toiled like a madman in a small room alone.

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Speaker 1: But he was not doing this toiling solo. He had

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Speaker 1: men from Phelps's machine shop at his disposal, and he

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Speaker 1: conducted the whole business with equal parts of foul, temper

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Speaker 1: and charm. As he got all of these men working

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Speaker 1: on things, he apparently was a bit moody, and sometimes

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Speaker 1: he would yell at the workman, and sometimes he would

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Speaker 1: sing to them. Singers Machine made you so many of

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Speaker 1: the technologies that other inventors had already come up with.

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Speaker 1: It could stitch continuously on a free arm, and it

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Speaker 1: could stitch curves. He added a thread control mechanism and

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Speaker 1: moved the needle into vertical positions. Singers Machine included a

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Speaker 1: presser foot, which offered greater control of the fabric as

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Speaker 1: it passed through the needles stitching mechanism, and it could

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Speaker 1: sew at a blazing nine hundred stitches a minute. And

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Speaker 1: for context of how amazing this is, you have to

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Speaker 1: remember that this was a time when sewing was an

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Speaker 1: essential skill for just about every woman who kept a house,

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Speaker 1: and sewing was extremely time consuming. She had to do

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Speaker 1: all of the hand stitching that maintained her family's wardrobe,

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Speaker 1: and that took up a significant chunk of her life. Normally,

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Speaker 1: Singer went back to New York to apply for the

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Speaker 1: patent on the machine, as well as for the birth

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Speaker 1: of yet another child with Mary Anne. Isaac allegedly showed

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Speaker 1: the midwife and the nurse who were on hand this

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Speaker 1: exceptional machine that he had designed for sewing even while

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Speaker 1: Mary Anne was in labor to deliver their child. Unfortunately,

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Speaker 1: the new baby only survived for a few days. Uh.

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Speaker 1: He also kept from his partners the fact that while

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Speaker 1: he was in New York filing the patent for this trip,

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Speaker 1: he only put his name on the paperwork. Pretty much.

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Speaker 1: Isaac Singer and his partners immediately started advertising and marketing

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Speaker 1: the sewing machine, and Singer called on his experience in

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Speaker 1: the theater to do so. He would stage demonstrations at

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Speaker 1: fairs and in stores, and he would sing a melodic

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Speaker 1: version of the poem The Song of the Shirt by

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Speaker 1: Thomas Hood throughout these demonstrations to try to help drying crowds.

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Speaker 1: And this machine worked, and it worked really well. Previous

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Speaker 1: versions of the sewing machine had been persnickety and prone

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Speaker 1: to breaking down, but the Singer machine was consistent and sturdy. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I will give him that for sure. The reputation that

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Speaker 1: continued to follow I mean, I I have I have

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Speaker 1: bought a sewing machine in a long time, but I

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Speaker 1: know when I was learning on my mother's singer that

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Speaker 1: was still the rip station they had. Yeah, they we'll

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Speaker 1: talk about it a little at the end. They had

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Speaker 1: a little dip in the like eighties and nineties, but

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Speaker 1: then they've kind of bounced back. And again, I mean,

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Speaker 1: you have to give him credit. He really did sort

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Speaker 1: of smooth out the problems that most machines had. And

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Speaker 1: that song of the shirt, if you've never heard it,

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Speaker 1: is kind of about a person toiling and and you know,

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Speaker 1: needing to take time to work on things. So, uh,

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Speaker 1: while we credit him, was smoothing out a lot of

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Speaker 1: problems there in terms of the engineering of the sewing machine.

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Speaker 1: As you know, if you listen to our episode on

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Speaker 1: the sewing machine and its invention, you know that many

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Speaker 1: of those previously existing technologies that Singer was using had

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Speaker 1: been created or significantly modified by a man named Elias How.

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Speaker 1: And when How got wind of Singers machine, which happened

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Speaker 1: when he saw one of singers older sons demonstrating it,

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Speaker 1: he immediately claimed patent infringement. How first demanded a royalty

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Speaker 1: payment of two thousand dollars, but Singer, who was not

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Speaker 1: the last bit shy about being aggressive in business, responded

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Speaker 1: with physical threats. It's basically kicked off a long and

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Speaker 1: contentious relationship for the two men, and we won't rehash

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Speaker 1: the entire thing since we talked about it in detail

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Speaker 1: in that previous episode, but here are some highlights. As How,

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Speaker 1: who had pursued legal action against several other inventors who

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Speaker 1: he claimed we're also using his sewing machine designs, started

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Speaker 1: to have some success in those legal efforts, Singer, worried

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Speaker 1: that it might work against him, went on the offensive,

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Speaker 1: so uh he tried to discredit house position as inventor

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Speaker 1: of many of the items that he claimed patent rights too,

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Speaker 1: and he also started a smear campaign against How in

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Speaker 1: the press, with which How fought with a libel suit.

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Speaker 1: There was eventually a patent trial, and How was ultimately

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Speaker 1: the winner in that legal battle. Throughout all of this

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Speaker 1: legal wrangling, Singer was producing sewing machines and refining his design.

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Speaker 1: He partnered with another man, Edward Clark, in the meantime.

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Speaker 1: In eighteen fifty five, the Singer sewing machine won a

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Speaker 1: first place medallion at the Paris World's Fair after Clark

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Speaker 1: submitted it to the exposition, and the ire and the

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Speaker 1: legal wrangling around the sewing machine and who had invented

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Speaker 1: what did eventually die down as part of that. In

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Speaker 1: eighteen fifty six, the Sewing Machine Trust, which was a

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Speaker 1: combination patent held by how Singer and a few additional

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Speaker 1: inventors who all had skin in the sewing machine game,

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Speaker 1: was formed, and this rights agreement allowed all of the

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Speaker 1: various players to benefit from the manufacture of the machine

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Speaker 1: that all of them had really contributed to developing. The

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Speaker 1: year after the Sewing Machine Trust, in eighteen fifty seven,

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Speaker 1: Singer and Clark formed I AM, Singer and Company. And

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Speaker 1: this is a really momentous step in the shift of

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Speaker 1: sewing machines from industrial tools to home goods. Clark and

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Speaker 1: Singer very smartly started mass manufacturing sewing machine parts in

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Speaker 1: New York, and in doing so, they made it possible

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Speaker 1: to produce machines at a significantly reduced cost. And this

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Speaker 1: meant that people could buy machines for home use for

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Speaker 1: just one hundred dollars, and they did. The Singer sewing

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Speaker 1: Machine was so successful that the company opened three more

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Speaker 1: new York manufacturing facilities just one year later. Additionally, Singer,

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Speaker 1: who was guided by the astute business acumen of Edward Clark,

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Speaker 1: set up rent to own payment plans where customers could

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Speaker 1: pay a monthly rate for their new machine, eventually paying

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Speaker 1: more than they would have if they had just bought

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Speaker 1: it outright, but owning it at the end of the

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Speaker 1: rental agreement and being able to use it in the meantime.

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Speaker 1: Singer also started hiring women to demonstrate the machines instead

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Speaker 1: of the male members of his team, to prove that

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Speaker 1: even the finest of ladies can handle the machinery that

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Speaker 1: he built, and to really make sure his sewing machine

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Speaker 1: became a standard in the homes of all respectable ladies.

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Speaker 1: He offered machines at discounted prices to the wives of

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Speaker 1: pastors and ministers of all denominations. So while how gets

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Speaker 1: the credit for inventing the sewing scene, most of the

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Speaker 1: time we've talked about in that old episode, it's a

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Speaker 1: lot more complicated than that. Singer is really the man

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Speaker 1: who brought it into the home market in eighteen sixty,

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Speaker 1: so just a few years after the partnership with Clark,

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Speaker 1: I am Singer and Company was the largest manufacturer of

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Speaker 1: sewing machines in the world, and this the massive sales

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Speaker 1: numbers that they were able to start making outside of

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Speaker 1: the US actually positioned the company really well to whether

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Speaker 1: the storm of the U. S Civil War intact part

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Speaker 1: of that success. Particularly the personal wealth that Isaac Singer

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Speaker 1: enjoyed was the result of aggressive and often ruthless business

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Speaker 1: practices on entrepreneurs part. When he had first started his company,

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Speaker 1: you'll recall he had gained financial backing and shop access

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Speaker 1: from George B. Zeeber and orcein Cy Phelps, but he

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Speaker 1: had absolutely no sentimentality about that relationship. Uh. In terms

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Speaker 1: of Isaac Singer, he really didn't care for those men,

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Speaker 1: particularly Apparently he bullied Phelps out of the company really

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Speaker 1: early on, and then he pressured Zeber to sell his

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Speaker 1: interest to him when Zebra was told he was quite

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Speaker 1: ill and believed that he was at the end of

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Speaker 1: his life. Incidentally, Zebra was not either of those things,

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Speaker 1: But while he was pondering his seemingly imminent death, Singer

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Speaker 1: told him that he should wrap up his business affairs

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Speaker 1: and take a buy out before he passed, so that

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Speaker 1: would spare his grieving family. The fiscal troubles that they

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00:20:31,920 --> 00:20:34,840
Speaker 1: would need to wrap up once he was gone. Singer

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00:20:34,960 --> 00:20:37,639
Speaker 1: got his buy out, but as it turned out, it

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00:20:37,720 --> 00:20:41,919
Speaker 1: had all been an elaborate trick on his part. I

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Speaker 1: feel like we're saying this over and over, but what

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Speaker 1: a jerk? What a jerk? Uh. We are now going

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Speaker 1: to speak a little bit more about Isaac's later life

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Speaker 1: and how his philandering eventually caught up to him. We

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Speaker 1: will say what a jerk several more times, I have

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Speaker 1: no doubt. But first we are gonna pause and to

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Speaker 1: have a break. And here from one of our sponsors.

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Speaker 1: We've had some podcasts on the show before about people

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Speaker 1: who were really kind of ruthless in their business world

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Speaker 1: and then also hoarded the profits. That was not Isaac

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Speaker 1: Singer at all. He was flamboyant in his spending. He

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Speaker 1: moved Marianne and their children from their humble home on

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Speaker 1: the Lower East Side to a progressively nicer lodging as

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Speaker 1: his success grew, and eventually they were on Fifth Avenue,

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Speaker 1: which was home to only the wealthiest families. His neighbors.

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Speaker 1: They're never really accepted Isaac and Maryanne, though they certainly

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00:21:43,040 --> 00:21:46,439
Speaker 1: partook in the huge parties that the duo hosted. The

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00:21:46,480 --> 00:21:51,240
Speaker 1: singers were nouveau reach and utterly goshen their taste. For example,

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Speaker 1: while he was in New York, singers main means of

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Speaker 1: transport was this black and bright yellow carriage that he

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Speaker 1: had designed and had custom built. This carriage was large

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00:22:02,000 --> 00:22:04,680
Speaker 1: that needed at least six horses to pull it, so

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Speaker 1: Isaac was contributing to the manure problem we discussed recently.

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Speaker 1: Sometimes he had more than that on the team he

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Speaker 1: would have He would have a live musicians ride along

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Speaker 1: with him so he could always have music, and as

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Speaker 1: many as thirty one passengers could ride in this vehicle,

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Speaker 1: which also had an onboard bathroom and sleeper beds, and

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00:22:27,280 --> 00:22:30,679
Speaker 1: he needed all those seats for his large and seemingly

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00:22:30,720 --> 00:22:34,199
Speaker 1: ever growing family. As his fortune grew, he made an

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00:22:34,200 --> 00:22:37,320
Speaker 1: effort to reconnect with his eldest son from his first marriage,

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Speaker 1: uh And in the early eighteen fifties, when things were

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Speaker 1: starting to really spark for him in the business world,

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00:22:43,480 --> 00:22:47,240
Speaker 1: he also started two more long term affairs with women

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Speaker 1: named Mary McGonagall and Mary Eastwood Walters, both of whom

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00:22:50,640 --> 00:22:54,119
Speaker 1: lived in New York City. So this means that he

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Speaker 1: still had his estranged wife Catherine, as we said before,

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00:22:58,800 --> 00:23:02,840
Speaker 1: was allowed before their divorce king final, as well as

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Speaker 1: Marianne and these two new Mary's. Of course, there were

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Speaker 1: also more children with McGonagall and Walter's. And in eighteen

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Speaker 1: sixty he finally did divorce Catherine, although he made her

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Speaker 1: confess to adultery before he would give her her settlement

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Speaker 1: payout of ten thousand dollars. Yeah, and she had um

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Speaker 1: taken up residence is my understanding with another man at

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Speaker 1: that point. But she hadn't lived with him for a

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Speaker 1: long time, and he had been living with several other people. Uh,

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Speaker 1: And so it would seem that now he could fulfill

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Speaker 1: his promise that he would marry Marianne once his divorce

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Speaker 1: was settled, twenty four years after they first talked about it.

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Speaker 1: She had been patiently waiting for a quarter of a century.

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Speaker 1: But then he told her that he did not want

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Speaker 1: her to have power over him, so he was not

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Speaker 1: going to enter into a legal marriage. This is again

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Speaker 1: a point where we say, what a jerk. Sorry. Not

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Speaker 1: long after this, Mary and spotted Isaac riding in a

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Speaker 1: carriage with Mary McGonagall, and she began ranting at the

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Speaker 1: two of them. Singer later beat her for her outburst.

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Speaker 1: It was, not surprisingly, given his temper and business, not

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Speaker 1: the first or last time that he was violent with

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Speaker 1: a woman. He was, however, arrested this time because Marianne

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Speaker 1: called the police. Singer retired in eighteen sixty two, though

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00:24:25,640 --> 00:24:29,440
Speaker 1: his company, of course kept going strong. In eighteen sixty three,

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00:24:29,480 --> 00:24:33,280
Speaker 1: the company incorporated as the Singer Manufacturing Company. It had

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00:24:33,320 --> 00:24:35,399
Speaker 1: gained twenty two more patents at that point and it

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00:24:35,440 --> 00:24:38,720
Speaker 1: was planning to launch an overseas factory, which it did

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Speaker 1: in Glasgow, Scotland in eighteen sixty seven. When he retired,

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Speaker 1: he moved to Europe, and this is often characterized as

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Speaker 1: flight from New York because the Big Apple had grown

434
00:24:50,840 --> 00:24:55,320
Speaker 1: complicated and fraught for this ostentatious and philandering entrepreneur. He

435
00:24:55,400 --> 00:24:58,320
Speaker 1: was often being hounded by the press because of allegations,

436
00:24:58,560 --> 00:25:02,400
Speaker 1: allegations of domestic use. And additionally, all this press meant

437
00:25:02,440 --> 00:25:04,960
Speaker 1: that all these women who had set up households of

438
00:25:05,080 --> 00:25:09,520
Speaker 1: him knew that they were not unique in terms of

439
00:25:09,560 --> 00:25:13,199
Speaker 1: being his partner. Yeah, he had basically led each of

440
00:25:13,240 --> 00:25:16,280
Speaker 1: them to believe that they were living in a monogamous

441
00:25:16,320 --> 00:25:19,280
Speaker 1: household and that he just traveled a lot. But really

442
00:25:19,320 --> 00:25:23,240
Speaker 1: he had multiple households throughout the city. Uh mary Anne

443
00:25:23,240 --> 00:25:27,520
Speaker 1: Sponslor made a divorce case claim against Singers estate. She

444
00:25:27,640 --> 00:25:30,800
Speaker 1: claimed that they basically had a common law marriage, and

445
00:25:30,840 --> 00:25:33,680
Speaker 1: while she was awarded a large alimony payout of eight

446
00:25:33,680 --> 00:25:38,840
Speaker 1: thousand dollars annually, Singer renegotiated through his attorneys to a

447
00:25:38,960 --> 00:25:42,520
Speaker 1: much lower rate of fifty dollars per week. Mary Anne

448
00:25:42,600 --> 00:25:46,160
Speaker 1: ended up disgraced, however, and stripped of her alimony when

449
00:25:46,160 --> 00:25:48,760
Speaker 1: it was revealed that she had married another man shortly

450
00:25:48,800 --> 00:25:52,160
Speaker 1: after this settlement was reached. She was the one who

451
00:25:52,240 --> 00:25:56,560
Speaker 1: ended up scandalized as an adulterer. Despite singers constant infidelities

452
00:25:56,560 --> 00:26:00,280
Speaker 1: to multiple women at once the common law marriage was dissolved,

453
00:26:00,560 --> 00:26:03,880
Speaker 1: she was left with nothing. He had been the man

454
00:26:03,920 --> 00:26:06,040
Speaker 1: of the house in three different houses at the same time,

455
00:26:06,080 --> 00:26:09,160
Speaker 1: and he had eighteen children, and in a deeply seedy move,

456
00:26:09,280 --> 00:26:12,719
Speaker 1: Mary mcgonagall's younger sister, Kate, traveled to Europe with him

457
00:26:12,760 --> 00:26:15,320
Speaker 1: as his companion when he fled, although the two of

458
00:26:15,320 --> 00:26:17,640
Speaker 1: them didn't stay together long and where she went from

459
00:26:17,680 --> 00:26:22,760
Speaker 1: there is not clear. In eighteen sixty three, while he

460
00:26:22,920 --> 00:26:25,040
Speaker 1: returned on a visit to New York to settle his

461
00:26:25,080 --> 00:26:28,760
Speaker 1: divorce from sponsoror and dissolve his partnership with Clark. As

462
00:26:28,800 --> 00:26:32,040
Speaker 1: part of the incorporation of the company, Singer married his

463
00:26:32,200 --> 00:26:36,520
Speaker 1: second wife, who was already very, very pregnant. Wife number

464
00:26:36,520 --> 00:26:40,679
Speaker 1: two was a woman named Isabel Eugenie Boys Somerville. She

465
00:26:40,800 --> 00:26:43,399
Speaker 1: was recently divorced herself and was just a young woman

466
00:26:43,520 --> 00:26:45,840
Speaker 1: in her twenties. And she was not any of the

467
00:26:45,880 --> 00:26:49,639
Speaker 1: other women we have already referenced. No, he was a

468
00:26:49,680 --> 00:26:51,800
Speaker 1: new one. She was a new one. So, after he

469
00:26:51,840 --> 00:26:54,840
Speaker 1: married for the second time, Isaac and his bride lived

470
00:26:55,240 --> 00:26:58,679
Speaker 1: in the Fifth Avenue home. During this time, his first wife,

471
00:26:59,040 --> 00:27:02,359
Speaker 1: his first wife, Catherine, attempted to renegotiate the terms of

472
00:27:02,359 --> 00:27:06,480
Speaker 1: their settlement again. This resulted in a rift between Isaac

473
00:27:06,640 --> 00:27:09,240
Speaker 1: and the oldest son that he had had with Catherine,

474
00:27:09,440 --> 00:27:11,760
Speaker 1: as he had asked the young man to testify in

475
00:27:11,840 --> 00:27:15,520
Speaker 1: court against his mother, threatening quote, take your choice, your

476
00:27:15,560 --> 00:27:18,720
Speaker 1: mother with poverty or me with riches. He also threatened

477
00:27:18,800 --> 00:27:22,480
Speaker 1: to kill his son, William when William refused to testify.

478
00:27:22,640 --> 00:27:25,920
Speaker 1: The court case was eventually dropped. Yeah, we don't really

479
00:27:25,920 --> 00:27:29,639
Speaker 1: know like how that played out and how the case

480
00:27:29,640 --> 00:27:32,840
Speaker 1: went away, But William never had to testify one way

481
00:27:32,880 --> 00:27:36,400
Speaker 1: or the other, but the relationship was pretty damaged. UH.

482
00:27:36,440 --> 00:27:39,440
Speaker 1: In eighteen sixty four, Singer and Isabel built a new

483
00:27:39,480 --> 00:27:43,320
Speaker 1: home called the Castle in Yonkers, and there they threw

484
00:27:43,480 --> 00:27:47,000
Speaker 1: a lavish housewarming party, but very few people attended. They

485
00:27:47,000 --> 00:27:49,719
Speaker 1: still had the problem that people just thought they were

486
00:27:49,800 --> 00:27:52,720
Speaker 1: nuvau reach and they weren't really all that respectable during

487
00:27:52,760 --> 00:27:56,119
Speaker 1: the post Civil War reconstruction era. And after only a

488
00:27:56,160 --> 00:27:58,919
Speaker 1: short time living at the Castle, the Singers moved to

489
00:27:59,000 --> 00:28:02,680
Speaker 1: Paris in eight sixty six. As the Franco Prussian War

490
00:28:02,760 --> 00:28:05,320
Speaker 1: broke out. In eighteen seventy, Isaac and the family moved

491
00:28:05,320 --> 00:28:08,960
Speaker 1: to England, where they settled permanently. He had a massive

492
00:28:09,040 --> 00:28:12,480
Speaker 1: French Renaissance style home built built in South Devon called

493
00:28:12,560 --> 00:28:15,480
Speaker 1: the Wigwam, and in it he included a private theater

494
00:28:15,560 --> 00:28:18,720
Speaker 1: along with every other lavish room imaginable where he and

495
00:28:18,720 --> 00:28:23,439
Speaker 1: the family would put on plays. And one of the

496
00:28:23,520 --> 00:28:28,439
Speaker 1: interesting things about Isaac Singer's many romantic partners and all

497
00:28:28,480 --> 00:28:31,480
Speaker 1: of those children he ended up with twenty four documented

498
00:28:32,000 --> 00:28:33,760
Speaker 1: by the time it was all done, because he and

499
00:28:33,880 --> 00:28:37,200
Speaker 1: Isabel had several UH, while he could not stay true

500
00:28:37,240 --> 00:28:41,120
Speaker 1: to one woman, he really was pretty devoted to his kids,

501
00:28:41,120 --> 00:28:44,640
Speaker 1: with the exception of his eldest son William. After that

502
00:28:44,720 --> 00:28:48,000
Speaker 1: failed bribery attempt for perjury that did not work out,

503
00:28:48,400 --> 00:28:51,480
Speaker 1: and his home in England was built in grand scale

504
00:28:51,560 --> 00:28:53,560
Speaker 1: so that all of the rest of his known children

505
00:28:53,640 --> 00:28:56,680
Speaker 1: could live there with him. At the Wigwam, it seemed

506
00:28:56,720 --> 00:28:59,360
Speaker 1: like Singer found a sort of piece that had eluded

507
00:28:59,480 --> 00:29:02,240
Speaker 1: him throughout his life up to that point. He threw

508
00:29:02,360 --> 00:29:05,800
Speaker 1: three spectacular parties there every year on the fourth of July,

509
00:29:05,960 --> 00:29:10,040
Speaker 1: Christmas Day and his birthday. He even played Father Christmas

510
00:29:10,040 --> 00:29:12,720
Speaker 1: and gave out toys and food to less fortunate children

511
00:29:12,760 --> 00:29:16,719
Speaker 1: in the area, and several of his kids ended up

512
00:29:16,760 --> 00:29:21,200
Speaker 1: connected to rather notable Europeans. His son Paris, who was

513
00:29:21,280 --> 00:29:24,720
Speaker 1: his son with Isabel, had a child with Isadora Duncan,

514
00:29:25,120 --> 00:29:27,920
Speaker 1: who is known as the mother of modern dance. And

515
00:29:27,920 --> 00:29:29,760
Speaker 1: if that name is ringing sort of a grizzly bell,

516
00:29:29,800 --> 00:29:32,080
Speaker 1: it's because yes, she is the person you're thinking of

517
00:29:32,120 --> 00:29:34,960
Speaker 1: that died in a rather horrific car accident when her

518
00:29:34,960 --> 00:29:37,840
Speaker 1: long dramatic scarf, which was blowing in the wind, became

519
00:29:37,960 --> 00:29:40,440
Speaker 1: entangled in the wheel and and then rear axle of

520
00:29:40,480 --> 00:29:44,600
Speaker 1: her vehicle. Isaac Singer died from heart disease on July

521
00:29:45,440 --> 00:29:48,400
Speaker 1: eighteen seventy five. He was sixty three at the time,

522
00:29:48,440 --> 00:29:51,320
Speaker 1: and his wealth, which was estimated at eighteen million dollars

523
00:29:51,360 --> 00:29:54,880
Speaker 1: when he died, uh just invited immediate squabbling from the

524
00:29:54,960 --> 00:29:58,200
Speaker 1: many families he had started through the years. But he

525
00:29:58,240 --> 00:30:01,600
Speaker 1: had carefully arranged his will, so the money was divided

526
00:30:01,600 --> 00:30:06,520
Speaker 1: into sixty equal parts and distributed among his family members,

527
00:30:06,640 --> 00:30:10,560
Speaker 1: some of them receiving multiple portions. Yeah, it was very

528
00:30:10,640 --> 00:30:13,320
Speaker 1: very clear that he had favorites, like some kids would get,

529
00:30:13,800 --> 00:30:16,440
Speaker 1: you know, four or five portions and others would get

530
00:30:16,440 --> 00:30:19,640
Speaker 1: only a couple. Uh. And while William, with whom he

531
00:30:19,680 --> 00:30:22,320
Speaker 1: had fallen had that huge falling out, received only the

532
00:30:22,360 --> 00:30:26,840
Speaker 1: relatively tiny sum of five hundred dollars, and William's sister Lillian,

533
00:30:26,920 --> 00:30:30,960
Speaker 1: who was also Catherine's child, only got one thousand. Uh.

534
00:30:31,040 --> 00:30:33,680
Speaker 1: An interesting thing happened here, which is that the other

535
00:30:33,720 --> 00:30:37,080
Speaker 1: illegitimate Singer children, who had fared much better in the will,

536
00:30:37,480 --> 00:30:40,560
Speaker 1: each gave up a portion of their inheritance to supplement

537
00:30:40,600 --> 00:30:45,640
Speaker 1: those amounts that William and Lillian received, and so uh. Then,

538
00:30:45,840 --> 00:30:51,400
Speaker 1: of his many wives and other paramours, only Isabelle was

539
00:30:51,440 --> 00:30:54,120
Speaker 1: recognized in the will with any sort of monetary payout.

540
00:30:54,800 --> 00:30:57,560
Speaker 1: And while the Singer Company and its manufacture of sewing

541
00:30:57,600 --> 00:31:00,160
Speaker 1: machines did go through some bumpy times over the years,

542
00:31:00,200 --> 00:31:03,520
Speaker 1: as we alluded to earlier, it still remains a recognized

543
00:31:03,560 --> 00:31:09,560
Speaker 1: and pretty respectable name in the home sewing market. Yeah, uh,

544
00:31:09,880 --> 00:31:13,280
Speaker 1: you know, more than two hundred years after he was born,

545
00:31:13,400 --> 00:31:17,360
Speaker 1: his company keeps on trucking. I have a Singer that

546
00:31:17,520 --> 00:31:21,720
Speaker 1: is from nineteen eleven that has been in my husband's

547
00:31:21,720 --> 00:31:26,640
Speaker 1: family since it came off the manufacturing line. I need

548
00:31:26,680 --> 00:31:29,000
Speaker 1: to replace one of the belts or one belt on him.

549
00:31:29,120 --> 00:31:31,560
Speaker 1: There are one thing, They'll go forever, but they do

550
00:31:31,640 --> 00:31:35,600
Speaker 1: need some maintenance. There are some similarly old Singers in

551
00:31:35,640 --> 00:31:38,480
Speaker 1: my family. And then the one that I learned to

552
00:31:38,560 --> 00:31:42,360
Speaker 1: sew on was my mother's and that one was probably

553
00:31:42,800 --> 00:31:49,680
Speaker 1: from uh like the at the at the latest early seventies,

554
00:31:49,680 --> 00:31:52,800
Speaker 1: because she would have bought it before I was born. Um,

555
00:31:52,840 --> 00:31:55,000
Speaker 1: and then I used that as my sewing machine for

556
00:31:55,000 --> 00:31:57,760
Speaker 1: a while, and then we sort of traded sewing machines

557
00:31:58,520 --> 00:32:00,200
Speaker 1: after a while. So I'm pretty sure that and is

558
00:32:00,240 --> 00:32:03,320
Speaker 1: still in their home and still working. Probably that was

559
00:32:03,360 --> 00:32:06,560
Speaker 1: when they normally the home sewing market. Even though they

560
00:32:06,560 --> 00:32:09,200
Speaker 1: were the modernized machines not the old you know, cast

561
00:32:09,240 --> 00:32:13,280
Speaker 1: iron based treadles, they still had metal gears, whereas there

562
00:32:13,320 --> 00:32:15,440
Speaker 1: was a shift later to plastic gears, so they did

563
00:32:15,520 --> 00:32:17,880
Speaker 1: not last quite as long. And if you sewed a

564
00:32:17,920 --> 00:32:20,560
Speaker 1: whole lot over the course of several days, I discovered

565
00:32:20,600 --> 00:32:27,360
Speaker 1: the hard way you could fuse those gears together. Um.

566
00:32:27,400 --> 00:32:31,000
Speaker 1: But yeah, I mean, his legacy still remains, and it's

567
00:32:31,040 --> 00:32:33,680
Speaker 1: it always kind of cracks me up when you see like,

568
00:32:34,000 --> 00:32:38,120
Speaker 1: um him listed as like a great American entrepreneur and

569
00:32:38,120 --> 00:32:40,400
Speaker 1: I'm like, wow, he did some cool stuff, but we

570
00:32:40,480 --> 00:32:42,320
Speaker 1: gotta take a look at what was really going on

571
00:32:42,360 --> 00:32:45,840
Speaker 1: in his life because he was maybe not the best dude.

572
00:32:47,080 --> 00:32:50,360
Speaker 1: Uh yeah, highs and lows with that one. We have

573
00:32:50,400 --> 00:32:55,400
Speaker 1: a number of of like inventors of things with really

574
00:32:55,480 --> 00:33:01,720
Speaker 1: checkered pasts in our guys. I don't know. Yeah, I

575
00:33:01,800 --> 00:33:04,280
Speaker 1: also wanna, you know, I should give him some extra

576
00:33:04,320 --> 00:33:06,800
Speaker 1: guilt on that manure crisis thing, because while we talked

577
00:33:06,800 --> 00:33:10,320
Speaker 1: about the one huge carriage, he had many, many carriages

578
00:33:10,360 --> 00:33:12,040
Speaker 1: and he liked to race them up and down Fifth

579
00:33:12,080 --> 00:33:16,480
Speaker 1: Avenue to show off. Uh, So he was contributing more

580
00:33:16,520 --> 00:33:18,960
Speaker 1: than just that six to nine horse team that carried

581
00:33:19,000 --> 00:33:25,800
Speaker 1: the big crazy size one. Oh, Isaac Singer, You're a

582
00:33:25,880 --> 00:33:31,680
Speaker 1: mess a listener, Now I do. I have a couple

583
00:33:31,680 --> 00:33:33,240
Speaker 1: of pieces. I'm gonna try to be quick because I

584
00:33:33,280 --> 00:33:35,680
Speaker 1: know this episode ran really long. The first is from

585
00:33:35,680 --> 00:33:37,960
Speaker 1: our listener Abby, and she says, Dear Tracy and Holly,

586
00:33:38,040 --> 00:33:40,320
Speaker 1: I'm a longtime listener and was so excited to hear

587
00:33:40,360 --> 00:33:42,680
Speaker 1: you did a podcast on the Acumenate Empire because I

588
00:33:42,720 --> 00:33:45,360
Speaker 1: first started listening to stuff you missed in history class

589
00:33:45,360 --> 00:33:47,600
Speaker 1: in two thousand nine while living in the lands of

590
00:33:47,640 --> 00:33:50,320
Speaker 1: the ancient Acumenates. I was blessed to serve as a

591
00:33:50,320 --> 00:33:53,320
Speaker 1: peace Corpse volunteer in Turkmenistan from two thousand eight to

592
00:33:53,400 --> 00:33:57,120
Speaker 1: twenty two ten, and I squealed with excitement when I

593
00:33:57,160 --> 00:34:00,280
Speaker 1: heard you all mentioned Turkmenistan on the podcast. It's like

594
00:34:00,320 --> 00:34:03,280
Speaker 1: I do whenever I hear that name. Your podcast holds

595
00:34:03,280 --> 00:34:05,320
Speaker 1: a truly special place in my heart because of my

596
00:34:05,400 --> 00:34:07,760
Speaker 1: time in Turkmenistan, which was equally one of the most

597
00:34:07,840 --> 00:34:10,920
Speaker 1: fulfilling and lonely periods of my life, and it provided

598
00:34:10,960 --> 00:34:14,200
Speaker 1: me with solace. I served teaching English as a foreign

599
00:34:14,239 --> 00:34:16,920
Speaker 1: language as a volunteer in a village about twenty miles

600
00:34:16,920 --> 00:34:20,600
Speaker 1: outside of the capital city. My village which I am

601
00:34:20,640 --> 00:34:22,879
Speaker 1: not going to try to pronounce, but it was named

602
00:34:22,880 --> 00:34:26,239
Speaker 1: after a famous Turkmen poet, Uh And she worked at

603
00:34:26,280 --> 00:34:29,280
Speaker 1: the local school, teaching English to fourth to eighth grade students.

604
00:34:29,480 --> 00:34:31,880
Speaker 1: And she was the first American volunteer to live in

605
00:34:31,880 --> 00:34:34,520
Speaker 1: that village and was therefore the first native English speaker

606
00:34:34,880 --> 00:34:37,759
Speaker 1: that many of those villagers had ever seen, so she

607
00:34:37,880 --> 00:34:40,720
Speaker 1: needed to rely on her knowledge of the Turkmen language

608
00:34:40,760 --> 00:34:43,120
Speaker 1: to get by every day. She says, well, I love teaching,

609
00:34:43,120 --> 00:34:46,719
Speaker 1: and I truly appreciated my experiences in Turkmenistan. Life could

610
00:34:46,719 --> 00:34:49,440
Speaker 1: become very lonely when your communication is limited. I was

611
00:34:49,480 --> 00:34:52,920
Speaker 1: never very good at languages. I literally craved for conversation

612
00:34:53,040 --> 00:34:56,279
Speaker 1: and media in English. Another Peace Corps volunteer turned me

613
00:34:56,320 --> 00:34:58,680
Speaker 1: onto your podcast, and it became a great joy in

614
00:34:58,719 --> 00:35:01,480
Speaker 1: my life when English media is difficult to come by.

615
00:35:01,560 --> 00:35:03,440
Speaker 1: When I was lonely or having a tough time, and

616
00:35:03,440 --> 00:35:05,759
Speaker 1: I have rewatched all my episodes of the Office or

617
00:35:05,800 --> 00:35:08,800
Speaker 1: Gilmore Girls. Your podcast really helped me get by because

618
00:35:08,800 --> 00:35:10,600
Speaker 1: there was so much content that I could listen to,

619
00:35:11,000 --> 00:35:14,040
Speaker 1: and it actually felt like my brain was stimulated while

620
00:35:14,040 --> 00:35:16,239
Speaker 1: I realized it was your show's predecessors who got me

621
00:35:16,239 --> 00:35:19,359
Speaker 1: through some tough points in my personal Peace Corps experience.

622
00:35:19,640 --> 00:35:21,680
Speaker 1: I am confident that you ladies are providing soul as

623
00:35:21,719 --> 00:35:24,160
Speaker 1: for Peace Corps volunteers around the world, and for that,

624
00:35:24,239 --> 00:35:26,880
Speaker 1: I thank you. And she sent us some beautiful pictures

625
00:35:26,880 --> 00:35:29,759
Speaker 1: from Turkmenistan, and I just want to say thank you

626
00:35:29,800 --> 00:35:32,120
Speaker 1: to her as well. I one of my best friends

627
00:35:32,120 --> 00:35:34,440
Speaker 1: growing up and her husband both served in the Peace Corps.

628
00:35:34,480 --> 00:35:36,400
Speaker 1: I so appreciate the work that those people do, so

629
00:35:36,480 --> 00:35:38,839
Speaker 1: thank you, thank you, Thank you, Abby. I also wanted

630
00:35:38,880 --> 00:35:43,160
Speaker 1: to say a quick congratulations to Bethany and her husband Patrick,

631
00:35:43,200 --> 00:35:46,640
Speaker 1: who sent us a birth announcement of their baby Lucy

632
00:35:46,760 --> 00:35:50,040
Speaker 1: UH and they. Bethany mentioned that she listened to the

633
00:35:50,040 --> 00:35:52,160
Speaker 1: podcast a lot when she was on bed rest during

634
00:35:52,160 --> 00:35:57,239
Speaker 1: her pregnancy, and that UH she started the podcast at

635
00:35:57,239 --> 00:36:01,960
Speaker 1: one point when UH Loose You was having some issues

636
00:36:02,000 --> 00:36:05,080
Speaker 1: staying calm, and she started the podcast for herself, but

637
00:36:05,160 --> 00:36:09,360
Speaker 1: it actually stopped the baby crying immediately. I'm shocked that

638
00:36:09,400 --> 00:36:11,480
Speaker 1: I would have this effect on babies, since I'm scared

639
00:36:11,520 --> 00:36:13,640
Speaker 1: of them and they can smell fear. But I'm glad

640
00:36:13,680 --> 00:36:16,520
Speaker 1: it helped in this case. So congratulations Bethany and Patrick

641
00:36:16,600 --> 00:36:18,800
Speaker 1: on your your new little one, and I hope you

642
00:36:18,840 --> 00:36:21,360
Speaker 1: guys are all doing great. Uh. If you would like

643
00:36:21,400 --> 00:36:23,160
Speaker 1: to write to us, you can do so at History

644
00:36:23,160 --> 00:36:25,560
Speaker 1: Podcast at how stu works dot com. You can also

645
00:36:25,600 --> 00:36:29,160
Speaker 1: connect with us at Facebook dot com, slash missed in History,

646
00:36:29,560 --> 00:36:32,439
Speaker 1: on Twitter at mist in History, at pinterest dot com,

647
00:36:32,480 --> 00:36:35,400
Speaker 1: slash missed in History at mist in history dot tumbler

648
00:36:35,440 --> 00:36:38,359
Speaker 1: dot com, and on Instagram at miss in History. If

649
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Speaker 1: you want to learn a little bit more about a

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Speaker 1: subject related to today's episode, you can go to how

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Speaker 1: stu works dot com. Type in the words sewing machine

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Speaker 1: in the search bar and you will get an article

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Speaker 1: called how sewing machines work. So if you want to

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Speaker 1: really see how Isaac singers work culminated in one pretty

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Speaker 1: standardized way of sewing machines being put together, you will

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Speaker 1: learn it all there. If you want to visit us online,

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00:37:00,840 --> 00:37:02,359
Speaker 1: you can do that at mist in history dot com,

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Speaker 1: where we have every episode of the show ever, including

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Speaker 1: the ones by those predecessors that helped Abby get through

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Speaker 1: her Peace Corps time, as well as show notes for

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Speaker 1: any of the newer episodes that Tracy and I have

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Speaker 1: been working on together since we've been here, so there

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Speaker 1: are also some other goodies on there, so come and

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Speaker 1: visit us at mist in history dot com and how

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Speaker 1: Stuff Works dot com for more on this and thousands

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Speaker 1: of other topics because it has to works dot