Jan Matzeliger and the machine that made Lynn the shoe capital
How a Suriname-born inventor’s 1883 lasting machine transformed shoemaking in Lynn and how the city remembers him today.
In 1883 a Lynn shoe worker named Jan Ernst Matzeliger patented a machine that did the work of skilled hand-lasters many times faster. Here is who he was, what the machine changed and where Lynn remembers him.
His machine is a big part of the story of how Lynn became Shoe City, two decades after Lynn shoemakers led the 1860 strike.
From Paramaribo to Lynn
Jan Ernst Matzeliger was born in Paramaribo in what was then Dutch Guiana (now Suriname). According to the National Inventors Hall of Fame, he spent time at sea and later trained in shoe factories before moving to Lynn in the 1870s.
GBH reports that his factory experience in Lynn set the stage for the mechanical idea he would develop there.
The lasting machine and its patent
Matzeliger developed an automated shoe-lasting device and received U.S. Patent No. 274,207 for it on March 20, 1883.
The machine is described in the patent as an apparatus that mechanized the step of pulling and shaping the upper over the last, a task previously done entirely by hand.
What the machine changed
Contemporary accounts credit the lasting machine with raising the output of an expert hand-laster from roughly 50 pairs a day to several hundred. Some contemporary figures cited production near 700–750 pairs per day for factory operations using the device.
Those gains lowered unit cost and, within a few years, helped Lynn become the dominant shoe-manufacturing center in the United States, with hundreds of factories producing millions of pairs daily, according to GBH.
Death and what he did not receive
Matzeliger died in Lynn of tuberculosis on August 24, 1889, at age 36, and did not live to collect much of the wealth generated by his invention, the National Inventors Hall of Fame records.
His early death meant he missed seeing the full commercial scale of the transformation his machine started.
How Lynn remembers him
Jan E. Matzeliger is commemorated locally in several ways. The Smithsonian Institution’s collections and art inventory entries note a portrait in North Congregational Church and public references to his story in murals and other civic artworks.
The National Postal Museum records that he was honored on a 29-cent Black Heritage stamp issued September 15, 1991, with the first day of issue held in Lynn.
What remains today
Matzeliger’s grave and a monument are at Pine Grove Cemetery, 145 Boston St. The cemetery is an active, city-managed property listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
Frequently asked questions
Who was Jan Matzeliger?
Jan Ernst Matzeliger was a Lynn shoe worker who patented an automated shoe-lasting machine in 1883. He was born in Paramaribo in what was then Dutch Guiana (now Suriname), and moved to Lynn in the 1870s, according to the National Inventors Hall of Fame.
What did Matzeliger’s lasting machine do?
It mechanized the step of pulling and shaping the upper over the last, a task previously done entirely by hand. He received U.S. Patent No. 274,207 for it on March 20, 1883.
How much faster was the lasting machine than hand-lasting?
Contemporary accounts credit it with raising an expert hand-laster’s output from roughly 50 pairs a day to several hundred. Some contemporary figures cited production near 700–750 pairs per day for factory operations using the device.
How did Matzeliger die?
Matzeliger died in Lynn of tuberculosis on August 24, 1889, at age 36. The National Inventors Hall of Fame records that he did not live to collect much of the wealth his invention generated.
Where is Jan Matzeliger buried in Lynn?
His grave and a monument are at Pine Grove Cemetery, 145 Boston St. The cemetery is an active, city-managed property listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
Has Matzeliger been honored with a stamp?
Yes. The National Postal Museum records that he was honored on a 29-cent Black Heritage stamp issued September 15, 1991, with the first day of issue held in Lynn.
Sources: National Inventors Hall of Fame; GBH; U.S. Patent (Google Patents); National Postal Museum (Smithsonian); National Postal Museum (Smithsonian); National Park Service — Pine Grove Cemetery (NRHP nomination); Smithsonian Institution (collections and art inventory entries); City of Lynn (Pine Grove rules).
