A sewing machine is a fantastically useful thing to own, but too often sewing machines end up languishing in a closet because something wasn't working quite right the last time you tried to use it.

When we brought home an antique White Family Rotary treadle sewing machine from a thrift store last year, I thought it would be just like great-granny’s old Singer I’d used as a child. After we ...

1846: Elias Howe patents the first practical sewing machine and threads his way into the fabric of history. French tailor Barthelemy Thimonnier patented a device in 1830 that mechanized the typical ...