Part 1

[Transcriber's Note: Italic text is represented by _underscores_. Small capitals in the original have been converted to all capitals. Footnotes have been moved to the end of the text.]

A TREATISE

ON

HAT-MAKING AND FELTING,

INCLUDING A FULL

EXPOSITION OF THE SINGULAR PROPERTIES OF FUR, WOOL, AND HAIR.

BY

JOHN THOMSON, A PRACTICAL HATTER.

PHILADELPHIA: HENRY CAREY BAIRD, INDUSTRIAL PUBLISHER, 406 Walnut Street.

LONDON: E. & F. N. SPON, 48 Charing Cross.

1868.

Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1868, by

HENRY CAREY BAIRD,

in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States in and for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.

PHILADELPHIA: COLLINS, PRINTER, 705 JAYNE STREET.

CONTENTS.

Descriptions of furs, wools, hairs, &c. 11

The fulling mill 24

History of hats and hatting 25

The fashions 28

Preparation of materials 29

Stiffening and water-proofing materials 31

The blowing machine 35

The manufacture of hats 36

Shaving 44

Stiffening process 44

Ruffing or napping 45

Blocking 47

Dyeing 47

Pumicing or pouncing 48

Finishing 49

Silk hatting 52

Forming machines 56

Shoes and gaiters of felt 60

Printer's sheets 61

Cloth hats 63

Conclusion 65

TREATISE ON HAT-MAKING AND FELTING.

It is conceded as an axiom, that theory and practice, in the pursuit of any object, are in their natures essentially different and distinct. But at the same time they long for a mutual understanding each to confirm the assertions of the other, the consummation of all practical results being the mutual embrace and perfect reconciliation of these two attributes.

The writer of these pages, being a practical hatter, desires to describe intelligibly his calling, dispensing with all technical terms, at the same time conscious of being liable to receive an unfair criticism from his brother tradesmen, although perfectly innocent on their part, resulting from the prejudices engendered by the many would-be secrets that pertain to the different work-shops, together with their various modes and methods of working, all of which most generally are but trifles merely to gain a name.

The practice of a trade without a knowledge of the why and the wherefore of certain usages is a sad defect in any workman, but more especially in certain trades: Hatting being one of those which depends upon _second_ causes for its proficiency, we venture here an explanation with perfect confidence, hoping that the fraternity of hatters will be indulgent, and that they may profit by an experience of many years in the trade, and that for one error or omission in the writing of these sheets they will find compensation in the new ideas that will spring from their perusal, which may be an incentive to further improvements in the business resulting beneficially to all.

Theory without practice, or practice without theory, is like groping in the dark, and perfection in no trade can be attained till every effect can be traced to its cause, and _vice versa_.

It is much to be regretted that practical operative workmen are so diffident in writing and publishing their experience in their several trades and occupations, quietly permitting theorists ignorant of the business to glean as best they can from other parties the most intricate and complicated particulars of a trade, and hence the attempt to illustrate the most useful branches of an art often results in crude and even erroneous descriptions of things of the greatest moment, and the dissemination as correct, of that which is altogether at variance with the truth. In confirmation of the above, we may instance the manufacture of hats as described in a work of much merit, and which is accounted as worthy of all confidence, wherein the error above spoken of is but too plainly visible. Thus, in the supplement to the third edition of that most respectable work the Edinburgh "Encyclopedia Britannica," in the article Hat, an apology is made for the original treatise upon that subject, it being acknowledged as both defective and erroneous from the imperfect source of the information. Such a confession, and from such a source, sufficiently exonerates any one from egotism in an attempt to write a more perfect and correct description, coupling theory with practice; relieving the felting process from its misty obscurity by a faithful expose of the whole system: well knowing that an increase of business, like free trade, will be the result of a right understanding of a formerly supposed mystery, viz., the True cause of Felting.

Felt and felted articles being already in use, in many trades in addition to that of hat-making, necessitates a general and indeed a very full and lucid description of the materials of which they are made.

Descriptions of Furs, Wools, Hair, &c.

Fur, properly speaking, signifies the skins of various species of animals, dressed in alum or some other preparation with the hair on, and made into articles of wearing apparel; but the term fur also signifies the stuff that is cut from the skin, for the use of the hatter, and in this sense alone it will be employed in the following pages.

Hair, wool, fur, and animal down are simply slender filaments or thread-like fibres issuing out of the pores of the skins of animals, and all partaking of the same general nature, such as great ductility, flexibility, elasticity, and tenacity, differing entirely from the vegetable wools and downs, such as cotton, &c., which contain neither of these four great characteristics to any valuable or appreciable extent.

To characterize in a familiar way these several grades of material, it may be said that fur is distinguished from wool by its greater fineness and softness, and hair from wool by its straightness and stiffness. The nature of all these bearing some relation to each other, it will be necessary in this treatise to use the word hair occasionally to designate one and all of them, that word being most convenient, and tending to avoid confusion.

Simple as the idea may be, and though trifling in appearance, yet the study of a single hair is particularly interesting, both to the naturalist and the man of business, as will be seen when we mention a few of its many peculiarities; hoping it will prove a source of enjoyment to the one and a profit to the other.

Hair, wool, fur, &c., form quite an extraneous appendage to the skin, or body producing them, not at all directly dependent on the life of the animal for their own existence, for they have been known to live and grow for some time after the death of the animal itself. We also know that they live, grow, and die, showing all the signs of youth, maturity, and old age. Hair possesses no sensation at any period of its existence; of itself it has no feeling of touch, nor has it the power of voluntary action.

The growth of hair is peculiar as it projects and grows in length from the root, and not by the top as with vegetable productions, the lower portion lengthens out, and the top is merely projected forward; and when once cut, it never again resumes its tapering point.

Hair or fur of whatever quality, consists of a single slender filament, without a branch or knot of any kind, and that filament is a tube, which is filled with a fat oil, the color of the hair being derived from this oil.

By the chemical analysis of hair it is found to consist of nine different substances: 1st, gelatine or animal matter, which constitutes its greater part; 2d, a white concrete oil in small quantity; 3d, another oil of a grayish-green color more abundant, these oils comprising about one-fourth of the entire weight; 4th, a few particles of oxide of manganese; 5th, iron, the state of which in the hair is unknown; 6th, phosphate of lime; 7th, carbonate of lime in very small quantity; 8th, silex in greater abundance; 9th, and lastly, a considerable amount of sulphur--such is the constitution of all furs, wools, hair, &c., most of which may be dissolved in pure water heated to a temperature above 230° of Fahrenheit, by which it is partially decomposed. Hair is likewise soluble in alkalies, with which it forms soap. Chlorine gas immediately decomposes it, producing a viscid mass.

It is worthy of particular remark, that of all animal products, hair is the one least liable to spontaneous change, evidence of which may be found in the fact that the Peruvian, Mexican, and Brazilian mummy hair is still perfect, and is supposed to be from 2500 to 3000 years old, and stands the hygrometric test with equal firmness. From this we should suppose the body or substance of hair and wool to be exceedingly hard and solid, which is really the case, as no pressure has yet been applied sufficiently powerful to entirely deprive wool of the water with which it has been washed--the interstices between the fibres of the assemblage never having been closed by the power applied, as the water therein collected may still be drained off when the pressure is removed.

Although hair is of a tubular construction, yet all varieties are not of a completely cylindrical form; a curl is the result of all flat-sided or oval hairs, the exceeding oval being the unfailing characteristic of the negro race. A cross section of a hair, if circular, denotes the long, soft, and lank fibre of a cold northern animal; but if the cross section shows an extreme flat-sided hair, that hair will be crisp and frizzled, and of a tropical extraction. Quite a gradual change in the form of the fibre of hair is observed in all animals as we ascend from the equator to the highest latitudes, other things being equal.

It has long been a desideratum how to discriminate between the various qualities of hatters' _fine_ furs, and no really reliable test has yet been obtained, superior to the judgment of the human eye, the fineness of fibre for the hatter being of most essential importance, particularly that allotted for the flowing nap upon the outside of the hat. Although the thickness of the fibre of the finer furs has never been properly gauged, it will be a source of some satisfaction to know that the diameter of the human hair varies from the 250th to the 600th part of an inch, while the fibre of the coarsest wool is about the 500th and the finest about the 1500th part of an inch.

Hair may be bleached on the grass like linen, after previous washing and steeping in a bleaching liquid, after which it may be dyed of any color.

It is very doubtful whether the growth of hair can by any artificial means be expedited, or the hair itself increased in length, in quality, or in density. A fine field of enterprise would be opened for the fortunate inventor who could increase the produce of the finer and more expensive furs. In contradistinction to this, however, it may be stated that the inhabitants of some countries, the Malays, for instance, purposely destroy their hair by using quick-lime.

We come next to describe minutely another peculiarity appertaining to hair, upon which all felting or shrinking of a fabric depends; that grand secret that has been a mystery in all ages, until within a few years, or at best was only surmised. Upon this property alone depends the whole art of hatting and of felt making, whether in sheets or otherwise, as well as the fulling of cloth and the shrinking of flannels, and all articles the material of which is made of wool, hair, or fur.

As many branches of business depend for their success upon the _non-shrinking_ quality of their goods, a study of the felting principle becomes quite appropriate and interesting to those manufacturers, whilst perusing that of the opposite. Pulled wools, rather than cut or shorn wools, must always have the preference with the one class of manufacturers; at the same time, the other class must adhere tenaciously to those which have been cut, the roots of the hair causing all the difference, for that remarkable quality, the felting principle, is upon all the same whether pulled or cut.

A few familiar facts dependent upon this inherent felting quality of hair will aid the illustration. When a hair is held by the top, it can be severed with a razor much more readily than if held by the root. Again, a hair held by the root, and drawn through between the finger and thumb, feels quite smooth, but when held by the top, a rough and tremulous motion is perceived.

Again, place a hair of three or four inches in length by the middle, between the finger and thumb, and twirl it a few times, when the hair will be found to proceed towards one end, as the twirling and rubbing are continued, and invariably advancing root end foremost, whichever way the hair is placed between the fingers. If two hairs are used in this example, lay the root of the one to the top of the other, their respective motions will be doubly discernible.

The cause of all these singularities of the hair it is now designed to explain, which shall be done as explicitly and concisely as possible, with a few proofs of its astonishing power in a collective capacity.

The above-mentioned phenomena are the result of that same long-hidden property, and which is nothing more than a certain clothing or covering, entirely surrounding the stem of every hair, in the form of very minute scales, so very minute, indeed, that it requires the aid of a very powerful microscope to enable the beholder to discern them, and even then but faintly. These scales, which cover thickly every filament of animal hair, wool, fur, &c., are thin pointed lamina, quite similar to the scales on a fish, and overlapping each other as do the shingles or slates upon a house. This state of the hair being understood, the _modus operandi_ of the above examples may be thus explained: When the hair was held by the point, it was easily cut by the edge of the razor entering under the scales; but when held by the root, the instrument slipped smoothly over them; and the hair that was drawn through the fingers, when held by the point, felt rough and tremulous, from the jagged points of the scales, but smooth when drawn in their own direction.

The twirling of the hairs between the finger and thumb, resulting in their travelling motion, was on account of the points of the scales catching on the fingers, in the act of rubbing, similar to the heads of wheat or barley at harvest time which school-boys put into the sleeves of their coats, and which are sure to come out at some other extremity to that at which they were put in, caused by the working of the boy's arm upon the jaggy beard or awn of the barley head.

The task of counting the number of these lamina that clothe the body of these hairs, must have been both tedious and difficult, from their very minuteness and profusion. On a single filament of merino wool, as many as 2400 barbed scales, like teeth, projecting from the centre stem, have been counted in the space of one inch. On Saxony wool there were 2700, while other wools were as low as 1860, and none were found to have so few as 1000 to the inch.

No vegetable wools whatever, such as cotton, &c., have any such appendage upon their fibres, and, consequently, cotton or cotton goods never shrink in the act of washing, as woollen goods do. Cotton, therefore, never can become a suitable material for felting purposes, every fibre being smooth from end to end in either direction, and in contradistinction to fur, which, though equally smooth as the cotton in one way, rebels triumphantly when irritated in the contrary direction, as already described. Mechanically speaking, cotton is smooth, solid, and triangular, whilst wool is rough, tubular, and cylindrical.

The grand cause of that mysterious and curious operation called felting, fulling, shrinking, thickening, and solidifying of a fabric, whether of original loose wool, fur, or other stuff, or of that spun into yarn and woven into cloth, is the presence of these scales.

Till lately, the best operative hatter and the investigating philosopher were equally at a loss to explain upon what principle such effects were produced. Take, for instance, a handful of wet fur or wool, which is merely an assemblage of hairs; squeeze and press it, work it a little in the hand, and then observe the effect; for immediately upon pressing it a certain locomotion is thereby conferred upon every fibre of that assemblage, which is increased by every turn of position that is given to the body of wool. The rolling and pressing change the position of each fibre. A friction is produced upon every member composing the mass; a footing as it were is obtained from the scales of each, and the fur or wool being all bent or curled, a progressive motion goes on, interlacing each other in their travels, resulting in a compact, dense body, which may well challenge the goddesses of both patience and perseverance to undo. Every hair has been travelling in its own individual direction, boring, warping, grasping, holding, and twisting amongst its fellows like a collection of live worms.

The power of combination, like the fable of the bundle of sticks, is strikingly illustrated in the case of the hair, which when viewed singly seems so very insignificant, but collectively, and when pressed by the hand of oppression, hardship, and ill treatment, they combine and become strong and defiant, clasping each other in their embrace, tenaciously clinging to each other the more they are tortured, as if they were living rational beings, conscious of their innocence, and free from guilt.

Stockings, for instance, that are knit with soft-spun wool, for the use of whale fishermen in northern latitudes, are large enough, when first formed, to hold the whole man, but are felted down to the required size in the fulling mill, where they are battered, tossed about, and tortured to that degree that is required by their tormentors. The writer has seen a millful of these stockings whose sides were felted so firmly together, from a neglect of the workmen to turn them inside out, in due time, during the felting operation, that a knife was required to open them, and which actually failed in several instances, so firmly had their two sides grown together; common tearing having no effect whatever, each and every single hair had embraced its neighbors, and their mutual action defied all attempts to open these stockings.[A]

There are instances of ruminating animals having died from the effect of balls of hair having formed within their stomachs, hair by hair having accumulated while licking themselves with their tongues. These balls are all found to be as perfectly felted as the natural bend of the several hairs composing them would allow, the felting having been accomplished by the motions of the intestines of the animals. The disgorged balls from the stomachs of nocturnal fowls are all of the same nature.

As has been said, felt may be made of any kind of animal fur, wool, or hair, provided it be bent, crimped, or curled, for if straight as a bristle it would work out of the mass as readily as into it, and lose itself in the operator's hands.

All materials intended for felting must be cut from the pelt or skin, and not pulled, for the obvious reason that a pulled hair invariably brings with it its root, in the form of a button or bulb, which would greatly impede its progressive motion in the act of working, as each and every hair under the operation of felting bores into and amongst the other filaments of the fur composing the mass, root end foremost, a sharp point therefore is obtained by cutting. This rule is universally and invariably adopted by all hat furriers.

Wool of any great length of staple, after being carded, is pressed, and either clipped, cut, or chopped into shorter lengths, which facilitates the felting operation, and improves the solidity of the felt that is produced.[B]

The various materials most used in hat-making are the furs of the beaver, the otter, the rabbit, the hare, a species of the muskrat, a species of the monkey, a species of the seal, and a few others, together with Saxony and Spanish wools and the hair of camels and goats. Numerous as are these various names, most of the animals produce five or six different qualities of stuff, from particular parts of the same skin, varying greatly in price or value.

The finest furs all come from those animals that inhabit the coldest climates, and the season of the year in which any of them are killed greatly influences the quality of the fur; a summer skin of some of these animals being comparatively valueless, however excellent it might be in the winter season. And what is particularly worthy of the hatter's attention is, that fur that has been kept one or two years, after being cut from the skin, produces a better working, and a more solid article of felt, than fur from a newly-killed animal. The lamina of such fur seem to rise and erect themselves upon the stem of the hair by being kept, which may account for its better felting quality. This would appear to be confirmed by the well-known fact that the 5 lb. bags in which old fur stuffs have been kept are generally burst open.

One or two properties peculiar to furs and wools may still be mentioned, as, for instance, all felting, by whatever means accomplished, necessitates either a damp or wet process with the aid of heat, and the facility of thickening or solidifying is accelerated by the application of soap to the material under the operation. Or the water may be acidulated for the same purpose with a little sulphuric acid, as either of these acts as a penetrating solvent upon the natural oil of the animal which still remains between the stem and lamina or scales of the hair, thus baring the barbed points of the crusty scales, the better to catch and hold their grip upon each other.

Oil or grease, on the contrary, when applied directly upon wool, covers up these lamina or scales, thereby destroying their felting power, as is well known to all wool spinners, however little they may understand the real cause of its being so, further than the fact of giving to it a smooth gliding effect, so necessary for the object of their business.

It may be amusing, whether true or not, to know that the rude Turcomans are said to dwell, even to this day, in tents covered with felt, which they make by treading with their feet the raw material of which it is made, whilst it lies upon the ground, thus favoring the supposition that felting was invented prior to weaving.

However, so far as we can learn, a real systematic method of felting is comparatively of a late date, and until within a few years felt has been chiefly employed for hats and hats alone. This is, however, now but a branch of the felt manufacture, for plaids, coats, vests, pants, leggings, shoes, gaiters, slippers, mittens, and caps, the covering of steam cylinders and boilers, carpets, polishing cushions for jewellers and marble cutters, covering for the roofs of houses which is afterwards waterproofed, as also linings of water-tight compartments in ships and ship sheathing, and the covering for the blocks of calico and other printing, &c. &c., are now made of this material. As the nature of hair and the principle upon which its felting property depends become better known, the manufacture of felt will be stimulated and increased, and applied to many purposes other than those above enumerated, and not imagined at the present time.