Small and Mighty

Yesterday we took a trip to the antiques fair at wood green animal shelter near Huntingdon and I found this little beauty for £15.

And little is the word! It only measure 7 inches in height - and that is a normal sized reel of thread in it. Fortunately it takes normal sized needles.

It is a wonder and actually works. A few turns of the handle and I got some (wobbly) straight stitch out of it. It needs a good clean and some oiling but I am chuffed with it!

It came with the original user manual too.
It doesn't use a bobbin, just some ingenious twiddling with the top thread underneath.

The lady who sold it to me said it was from the 1950's which is probably about right having looked up the Essex Miniature sewing machine on the Internet. It is quite hard work though, so I wonder if any of the children who received this as a gift ever actually made anything with it!