Rare Sewing Treasure

I am so excited about what I bought this weekend!!! Around the corner and down the road a bit was an estate auction of a neighbor of ours. I looked around a bit and decided to stick around for awhile to see if I could pick a few things up for a good price. I didn't even see this beauty until they were getting ready to auction her off.

It's a 650 Sewing Machine made by the White Company. It is in its original sewing cabinet too. I have never seen a treadle sewing machine up close and personal before. A little background on the White Company I found after searching on the internet. It was started in 1876 in Cleveland, Ohio. They manufactured sewing machines in the U.S. until sometime around 1960-1970s. They then moved everything over to Japan. The Viking/Husqvarna/White Company is still around. I hope to call them this week and see what year my Family Rotary model is. They started making them in the 1890's but from the foot plate I can see that the earliest this model would be is 1913. That is the last patent stamped date. I doesn't matter to me what year it is, it's a treadle and it's COOL!

 I took me two days after buying it to finally get time to move the treadle and see what all the levers and pulleys do. I wanted to play around with it before I went searching for the manual online. This is what men normally do, right?? Well, low and behold, the manual was stuck in the back of one of the drawers! Along with all of the feet! I may or may not have jumped up and down for a few second at this point.

I will be the first to admit, it is anything but practical, but it will be a nice reminder of how far sewing machines have come. Right now, I have the space, not the time, but space to keep it around. So whenever that rare moment of everything is finished and I can dive into getting to know my newest sewing machine because it will be patiently waiting for me.

Thanks for reading...
Just a Mom who sews