Monday, November 27, 2017

Today in sidewalk finds



Earlier today, EVG contributor Derek Berg spotted this Singer antique treadle sewing machine with cabinet table up for grabs on Seventh Street ... a short time later, he spotted this couple taking it home...

15 comments:

  1. Whether you keep it for the cabinet, or as use it a working sewing machine, THAT is the Find of the Day!

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  2. Good for that couple! Those old Singer sewing machines were built like tanks. My grandmother had one just like that, and my mother had it converted from treadle to electric-powered and continued to use it for decades. And BTW, not that the wooden stand is beautifully made & finished.

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  3. Where is the treadle on this machine? Not convinced this is worth much as an antique without the treadle.

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  4. It has a very worn out power cord so there probably wasn't a treadle.

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  5. Will this be on E Bay

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  6. Donnie, I like to think they will sew with it! Which would make me happy, for reasons that are unclear. (Nostalgia?)

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  7. This Singer machine has steel gears, so you can sew almost anything on it -- from batiste and crepe to heavy woolen fabric. It is the Mack truck of sewing machines. Great find!

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  8. @Donnie: It doesn't have to have the treadle, and it doesn't need to be sold as an antique. It could be converted to electrical-pedal use even today, or, for all we know, it could be sold/rented as a prop. Glad these people salvaged it, whatever they are going to do with it.

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  9. I grew up with one of those and learned how to sew on it.
    The weirdest thing is that I dreamt about it LAST night!!!

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  10. Something like 20 years ago I saw a machine like this at the weekend antique fairs in what were then parking lots in the 20s on 6th avenue. I was told that although it looked old-fashioned and interesting, it was not worth much because there were so many of them in existence. This one does not have a treadle. Ok, if the machine works I can see someone taking it because they want to use it. Or if they like the look of the table they might try refinishing it and keeping it.

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  11. My grandma had this exact one. Only now since mr roommate brought used wood n bedbugs into my apt...I no longer take Street finds home. ;(. Cost me thousands to rid the bedbugs..

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  12. FIND ! A little cleaning and the machine is steady for another’s 30 or 40 yrs. far sturdier and effective than the cheap junk these days.

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  13. @Donnie: Nowadays there are not as many of them around, b/c so many people just threw them away. Only lately have I seen people begin to appreciate how tough that simple-looking machine is! Generations of my female relatives used machines identical to that, for everything from sewing fine silk items to making overcoats and coat linings.

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  14. I don't think that is true treadle machine where you literally pump the treadle to make it sew. This has an electric chord dangling off it. I had one like it and all it would do was a straight stitch. So reliable and always worked. Wish I had never replaced it with a machine that could do a zig zag stitch.

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