The Rhode Island Republican

Manufactory of Pins in Connecticut.

On a visit to Derby, Conn., some weeks since, I had the pleasure of inspecting the pin manufactory of Dr. Howe. The apparatus is a new invention of the Doctor, and is one of the most ingenious and beautiful pieces of Mechanism in the whole circle of the arts. It is impossible for me to give you any adequate description of it.—Those who have any fondness for mechanical ingenuity must see it for themselves.—Generally, I may state that the wire from which the pins are to be made is passed in at one end of the machine, cut into the requisite length and passed from point to point; till the pins are bended, and fitted for the process of silvering and putting up. The whole process may be distinctly seen, and as one pair of forceps hands the pin along to its neighbor, it is difficult to believe the machine is not an intelligent being.

The pins are all of one solid piece of wire, and possess an advantage in this respect over those upon which the head is wound, and thus liable to come off, often to the great inconvenience of tender fingers.—The process is exceedingly rapid. I think Dr. Howe informed me that one machine would make 17,000 pins in 11 hours, and a new machine which he had just put in operation, would make 27,000 in the same time. Formerly it required several men to make one pin—one to head it, one to point it, &c. and then only a few thousand could be made in a day—but one man could superintend 12 of these machines, and at the lowest estimate manufacture 200,000 pins daily.