"The number of new mechanical contrivances to which this branch of manufacture has given rise is altogether unparalleled in any other department of the arts." It was in 1764, a little more than a hundred years ago, that pillow-made net was first imitated by machinery. It was called frame-looped net, and was made by using one thread, as in hosiery, and, like hosiery, the lace would ravel when this thread was broken. The machine was, in fact, a modification of the stocking-frame. It was so much improved from time to time that net with six-sided meshes could be made, which, when stiffened, looked like cushion-net, but when damp it would shrink like crape.
Another machine was devised for making lace, called the warp-frame. The lace made by it, like the former, consisted of looped stitches, but a solid web was produced, which could be cut and sewed like cloth. In 1795 lace open-work was made by this machine, and soon afterward durable and cheap figured laces, in endless variety. "The lightest gossamer blond silk laces, cotton tattings and edgings, antimacassars and d'oyleys, threaded and pearled, are finished in this loom, and are the pioneers of higher-priced lace articles throughout the world. In 1810 there were four hundred warp-looms at work making the lace called Mechlin-net, and using cotton yarn costing fifteen guineas the pound."
But the most important step ever taken in the making of lace was the invention of the bobbin-net machine. Until this invention machine-lace was, for the most part, only a kind of knitting that had to be gummed and stiffened to give it the solidity of net. The great problem of the time was how to imitate pillow-made net by machinery. Numerous attempts to do this were made by smiths, weavers, and lace-makers. Much inventive talent was vainly spent, and many men of genius fell into poverty through their prolonged and unrequited efforts to construct the required machine. Insanity and self-destruction had ended the careers of some, and disappointment and misfortune befell them all, until at last the idea of such a machine was regarded as visionary it was classed with the perpetual motion.
John Heathcote, the inventor of the bobbin-net machine, was born in 1783. In youth he was remarkable for his quick acquisition of knowledge, his thoughtful intelligence, and quiet deportment. He was early placed at the hosiery manufacture, and at the age of sixteen he conceived the idea of constructing a machine to make lace. In 1804 he was at work as a journeyman at Nottingham, and is thus described by his employer: "Heathcote showed that he had already attained to a thorough knowledge of mechanical contrivances; was inventive and persevering; undaunted by difficulties or mistakes and consequent ill-success; patient, self-denying, and very taciturn. But he expressed surprising confidence that, by the application of mechanical principles to the construction of a twist-net machine, his efforts would be crowned with success." Being determined to construct a
