Dirty Dagny!

During QuiltCam time on the treadle on Sunday afternoon I received a phone call --- one I had to pick up while on camera because it was a call that I was waiting for.

I had sent an email the day before to contact the seller of a pink 1950’s Atlas machine.

The machine was a bit out of my way if I were just searching around my home area, but it turns out that it was ON the way to Kentucky yesterday.

I talked to the lady a little bit about machines, hers in particular.

Let me say this --- people are just INTERESTING!

“Does the machine work?”

“Yes.”

“It’s an early Singer”.

“I don’t think so ---it says Atlas on it, Singer never made machines under the Atlas brand. Likely it’s a Singer clone made in Japan in the late 1950s.”

“It’s an early electric machine.”

“I don’t think so --- Singer started electrifying machines around 1920 if not earlier, and this is from the late 1950s and made in Japan.”

It’s kind of like when you walk into an antique mall and there is a recently worn out Chinese “hand stitched" quilt that fell apart after two washings due to its toe-catcher stitches, and here they are trying to pass it off as a “rare antique.”

She said she had been the only owner and had gotten this as a gift after high school. Whether it had ever been used, I have no idea ---but I’d like to pass on a hint to those who sell things as “rare and valuable”

PLEASE DUST OFF THE COBWEBS and get the dead bugs out of the machine base!

This thing is SO dirty gritty I’m afraid to see what’s inside. It looks like it’s spent the last 40 years in the garden shed.

It’s just as dirty INSIDE! The bobbin tire is just hanging there. We go to plug the machine in ((Because she assured me it works!!)) And nothing goes. It’s a bit tight --- like..has it been oiled in the past 40 years? I’m not sure! It feels like there is thread caught….

I tilt it back and there is NO BOBBIN CASE. It takes a class 15 bobbin, I know I have a couple spares at home. It’s much more standard and easy to replace than the bobbin case for Tiffany, but --- this is in NO WAY in working condition. Dirty dirty dirty!

Tell me this --- if you are touting something as rare and valuable wouldn’t you clean it up before showing it to anyone? Wipe it down maybe? Test it out?

It still has the price tag/serial number tag attached to it!

The good housekeeping seal of approval!

It says plainly – ATLAS made in Japan.

Even though she is so dirty I’m still intrigued. Okay, I love pink machines – I just have a fondness in my girly-girl heart for them. I explain that this machine is going to need a LOT of work. She is asking $50. I come back with $35 explaining that if I take it to my vintage machine guy, likely it’s going to cost me at least $70 to get it gone through plus parts to replace the bobbin case, the tire and the belt and who knows what other problems it has.

She says she wants $50 for it. It means a lot to her. At this time I’m about to walk away and I explain again. You’ve had it listed a long time. It is not in running order. It is not an early Singer and these clones just do not fetch that much money, certainly not in this condition. You could be hanging onto this thing a long time before you sell it, or I could give you $35 for it right now. Your choice.

I explain that I am a vintage machine lover, and if she sells this machine to me it WILL get functional. It will live a good life being loved and used by someone who appreciates it. It will never be this dirty again.

She thinks about it and decides okay, $35 it is.

This is the emblem on the machine bed. Atlas holding up the world!

Little globes encircle the border around the machine bed.

Another reason I don’t think this machine ever saw much use --- the emblems are not worn. I really won’t know until I am able to really clean her up and see what I can do about it ---but this has been one long-neglected machine!

As to her name ----

How many of you have read Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand? I loved that book! And of course when I saw the emblem that is what I thought of ---that book!

So I’d like you to say hello to Dagny! Dagny was the main female character in the book ----which was very popular during the 50s.

Dagny it is.

And Dagnabbit if it ends up not working after all this!