“He used a needle and a shuttle of novel construction, and combined them with holding surfaces, feed mechanism and other devices, as they had never before been brought together, in one machine One of the principal features of Mr. Howe’s invention is the combination of a grooved needle, having an eye near its point, and vibrating in the direction of its length, with a side-pointed shuttle for effecting a locked stitch, and forming, with the threads, one on each side of the cloth, a firm and lasting seam not easily ripped.  The main action of the machine consists in the interlocking of the loop, made by the thread carried in the point of the needle through the cloth, with another thread passed through this loop by means of a shuttle entering and leaving it at every stitch.  The thread attached to this shuttle remains in the loop and secures the stitch as the needle is withdrawn to be ready to make the next one.  At the same time the cloth, held by little projecting pins to the baster plate, is carried along with this by what is called the ‘feed motion’ just the length of a stitch, the distance being readily adjusted for finer or coarser work. ....  The cloth is held in a vertical position in the machine, and the part to be sewed is pressed against the side of the shuttle-race by a presser plate hinged on its upper edge, and capable of exerting any required pressure on the cloth, according as the adjusting screw that regulates it is turned.  A slot, or perforation through the plate, also extended through the side of the shuttle-race near the bottom, admits the passage of the needle; and when this is pushed in the shuttle can still pass freely over it.  The shuttle is pushed one way and then the other through its race or trough by picker staves.  The thread for the needle is supplied by a bobbin, the movement of which is checked by a friction band, this securing the proper tension, and the slack of the thread is duly taken up by a suitable contrivance for the purpose.  Thus, all the essential features of the most approved sewing-machine were first found in that of Mr. Howe; and the machines of later date are, in fact, but modifications of it.”

At this time, he had abandoned his work as a journeyman mechanic, and had removed to his father’s house.  Mr. Howe, Sen., had established in Cambridge a machine-shop for the cutting of strips of palm-leaf used in the manufacture of hats.  Elias and his family lived under his father’s roof, and in the garret of the house the half-sick inventor put up a lathe, where he did a little work on his own account, and labored on his sewing-machine.  He was miserably poor, and could scarcely earn enough to provide food for his family; and, to make matters worse, his father, who was disposed to help him, lost his shop and its contents by fire.  Poor Elias was in a most deplorable condition.  He had his model in his head, and was fully satisfied of its excellence, but he had not the money to buy the materials needed in making a perfect machine, which would have to be constructed of steel and iron, and without which he could not hope to convince others of its value.  His great invention was useless to him without the five hundred dollars which he needed in the construction of a working model.