A little bit of history...

[Gary Brommeland]

I just bought a little Singer flatbed sewing machine from my neighbor for a whopping $100.
Here's what makes it interesting - I bought it from the nephew of Gene Autrey. It was originally owned by Gene's brother, who was an extraordinary saddlemaker. I've seen some samples of his tooling and floral carving - it is all technically perfect - and was all done FREEHAND!
According to his son, this guy never did any layout tracing whatsoever - everything he did went directly from his mind to the leather.
In any event, I thought it might be interesting to those of you who remember "The Singing Cowboy" that I've got the sewing machine used to make some of his gear...

[DefensiveCarry.com]

[Redneck Repairs]

Damm gary , i hope you more or less dedicate that machine to " special " holsters ect.. You just have to have a feeling of connection with an old school craftsman when you fire it up.

[havegunjoe]

Gene was one of the truly good guys, back when we had good guys. That is an interesting bit of history and thank you for sharing it with us.

[USPnTX]

Gary - are you back in the saddle again? Yeah, I know bad pun.

[rstickle]

If your cable system carries the Western Channel you can still catch Gene and his sidekicks. Some of his stuff is still fun to watch even after all these years...... Of course some comes off a little "hokey".

[JimmyC4]

Sorry, but I can't resist digressing here, please bear with me.

Wow, does that take me back a few years. I remember as a child when my parents took me to a performance by Gene Autry at the Saginaw Auditorium in Saginaw, Michigan.

I also remember seeing Roy Rogers there and was in awe when he came out, drew his two sixguns and fired them...as he shot, the spotlights went out...I was young enough that I actually fell for the effect, thinking that he had shot them out!

[Bark'n]

Very good find Gary! Thanks for sharing that little bit of history!

Great story and who the hell could beat that price!

Btw... I just got my Max-Con V for my XD9sc! Absolutely the BEST!

I wrote a little review.

I hope your recovery is going well. I gotta say, Remy informed us all that she was "crackin the whip" when you got home!

I wouldn't mess with her... you do as she says!

Take care my friend!

Thanks for a great product!

[sass20485]

That is VERY COOL Gary. Since I'm a cowboy at heart and very active in Cowboy Action Shooting, maybe you can do a stitch or two on my Max Con and mag carrier with it, when my order makes its way on to your work bench.

[NCHornet]

You should get the seller to doument all the history, if you ever needed to sell it this would make it a collectible to some.

[Todd]

maybe you can do a stitch or two on my Max Con and mag carrier with it, when my order makes its way on to your work bench.

I was thinking the exact same thing.

[Gary Brommeland]

Hi Guys,

Yep! I'm back to work part time (40-50 hrs a week). Will be full time in another week or so. (70 + hrs)

This particular machine is too light for serious holster work. My Campbell stitcher (that I use for holsters) weighs about 250-300 lbs (machine head only). This little Singer weighs about 40-50 lbs - my Campbell could almost eat it...
This little machine was used for stitching zippers and linings into leather gun cases and doing other lightweight work. It takes a # 69 thread - which will actually feed thru most household sewing machines. By contrast, I use #346 in the Campbell - which is just a tad smaller than the inner strands on a mil-spec 550 cord.

I'm probably going to set it up to sew nylon webbing for rifle slings and maybe gun cases. (I'm looking into branching out into a couple of new products)

Thanks for all the posts, guys. I'm glad to see that I'm not the only one who misses "the good ole days".

[los]

Greetings Gary.

Good to see you on the boards again! Awesome find on the sewing machine.

Looks like you're "back in the saddle again"! ..


-Jimmy

[QKShooter]

If I had not actually seen for myself a leather carver floral tooling a piece of leather "free hand" in the Sheridan Style I would not have believed it to be possible to do that. He must have been one heckova talented life-long leather carver.

Congrats on the Sewing Machine.
It sounds really nice AND of some decent historic value.

[Fastball]

Sounds cool!!

Who the hell is Gene Autrey????

Just kidding, guys!!!

Glad to hear from you, Gary!! Remember, slow and easy.

[jarhead79]

I'd kinda like to see that thing. Sounds neat.