HISTORIC ISSUES
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Vol.17
No.2 - 7/15/1882 |
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Courtesy of the New York
State Historical Association Library, Cooperstown, N.Y (.PDF files)
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April 2009
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February 2009
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New York Canal Times -
Online newspaper
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Mercury Media Group
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A Stitch in Time
By Terry Berkson |
Back in 2000, I finished one of my most satisfying projects of the year. I converted an old foot treadle Singer sewing machine to a coffee table. Alice had wanted a new table for years. The one we were using looked like it had been through a demolition derby.
| | Terry Berkson recently converted his grandmother’s Singer sewing machine to a coffee table. (Photo submitted) | |
The sewing machine had belonged to my grandmother, Fanny, and more than 60 years ago, I used to proudly thread the needle for her. It wound up in the cellar not long after she died and remained there for about 15 years until, to my dismay, a Canadian handyman working in the house stripped all the wood off the metal frame in order to make a foot-powered knife sharpener.
He never completed the job and the machine remained in the cellar for another 35 years. I often thought it would make a nice coffee table but I never came across the right piece of wood to mount on the frame – until last year when a nearby furniture store discarded a beautifully wide piece of pine that had been damaged.
I sanded and wire-brushed the rusty metal frame and gave it a super coat of flat black paint that I had used on the chassis of my Corvette. My uncle Vincent, who stopped by for a visit, helped me make a very precise slot in the wood that allowed the treadle wheel to come through and still be operable.
I puttied and sanded it and gave it three coats of Puritan Pine stain that really brought out the grain of the wood and the knots. Two coats of low luster varnish put the finishing touch on the job just in time for the holidays.
Alice loved it. My daughter Elizabeth called it a family heirloom and said she wants it when the time comes. My son Jonathan hadn’t seen it yet but I worried that he’d be having his usual dripping TV snacks on it.
I like to run my hand over the wood. Now, the table seems to have a connection with all of us. It feels good to know that Grandma’s sewing machine is still stitching things together.
Terry Berkson is an author living in Richfield Springs.
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Reader Discussion
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