1858.
Entered according to Act of Congress in the year 1858, by
W. H. RICHARDSON, Jr.,
In the Clerk’s Office of the District Court of Massachusetts.
PREFACE.
In preparing the following pages, the author has aimed to supply a want hitherto unsupplied. No work devoted to the wants of the Boot and Shoe-maker, manufacturer, or merchant, has ever been compiled. Able articles upon the “Trade,” statistical statements, and general comments upon matters of interest local in their character, and having particular reference to the state of the times in which they were written, have been published, perused and forgotten. But no work, containing a history of this important mechanical interest, together with instructions in the science of the Boot and Shoe manufacture, has ever been written. The Author does not flatter himself that he has, by any means, exhausted so fruitful a subject, but that he has prepared and compiled important facts and rules, and submitted valuable suggestions which are correct in theory, and practical in their application, he has not a doubt.
Within a few years, this important industrial interest has assumed almost wonderful proportions, and it now towers in magnitude and importance, above all its compeers. New elements have been introduced into the manufacture of boots and shoes, and fortunes have been expended in endeavoring to introduce new methods by which to cheapen the process of manufacture, as well as the raw material. The introduction of India-rubber and Gutta-percha as articles of mechanical use, has quickened the pulses of invention, and has already produced wonderful, and important changes in all departments of the mechanic arts, and more especially in that of boots and shoes. Already have these important vegetable gums, and the thousand uses of which they are susceptible, attracted the attention of the world, and last but not least, we are indebted to the discovery and use of Gutta-percha for the successful insulation of the Atlantic Cable, without which substance, the cable could not have been safely submerged. Establishments for the manufacture of India-rubber, and Gutta-percha, into almost every conceivable shape, have sprung up, as it were in a day. Patents for its use and application, are constantly presenting themselves. Heretofore, it has been the policy of all interested in the manufacture of India-rubber and Gutta-percha, to surround their inventions with an air of mystery. “No admittance” has been blazoned upon their laboratories, and no “open sesame” pronounced by the uninitiated, has succeeded in opening the doors to their carefully guarded treasures.
In this work, we have endeavored to make clear, simple, but important facts, scientific discoveries and observations, which, from practical experience, we know to be of great utility. A collection of the most approved recipes for the preparation of compounds of India-rubber, and Gutta-percha, would alone, make a volume worthy of preservation. But we have endeavored to present all the important rules, practical hints, and observations, necessary to the manufacture of boots and shoes, also an important and economical method of repairing the same.