Joseph Marie Jacquard

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(b Lyon, 7 July 1752; d Oullins, 7 Aug 1834). French silk-weaver and inventor. The son of a master weaver, he too became a weaver, having tried various other jobs. In the late 1790s, after fighting in the French Revolution, he turned his attention to improving the loom used for weaving patterned silks. This effort resulted in a drawloom for which he was accorded a patent on 23 January 1801 and awarded a bronze medal at the Second Public Exposition of the Products of French Industry in the autumn of the same year. He introduced the punch-card-controlled loom mechanism that bears his name in 1804 but never patented it (in this regard, it is often confused with the drawloom). The Jacquard mechanism, being the first practical application of punch-cards to the automatic control of a manufacturing process, had significance beyond the textile industry. It offered a solution to certain problems faced by 19th-century inventors of computing machines and can be considered a distant ancestor of 20th-century computers.

See the Abbreviations for further details.

Innovator of the loom that bears his name, Joseph Marie Jacquard (1752-1834) developed the first loom to weave designs into cloth. It was also recognized as the first machine to employ the punch-card technology, that would eventually program the computer of the mid-twentieth century.

In the 1700s, the European textile industry and specifically weaving, had not changed for hundreds of years. Using a loom, a weaver created woven fabrics by interlacing two sets of threads - taut lengthwise or "warp" threads that were crosswise, and "weft" or "filling" threads, at right angles. To create wide finished textiles, such as those used for window coverings, narrow lengths of fabric had to be woven by hand. Warp threads were then tautly stretched across the loom's frame, and raised and lowered by the loom's harness, to allow the weft threads to be woven between them. These intricately textured patterns, as well as multi-colored designs were time-consuming. Even so, with its generations of skilled weavers, by the mid-1800s, France was known around the world for the quality of its woven silks.

As ever-larger mechanized looms replaced skilled hand weavers in the 1790s, an explosion of woven goods appeared in European and American trade markets. These goods were inexpensive due to being mass-produced. However, these new, mechanized looms could not compete with the skilled manual labor required to create fabrics containing anything other than a plain or simple, woven pattern, such as a check or stripe.

It would be the invention of a Frenchman named Joseph Marie Jacquard that would spread mass production to these more complicated, and costly, textile designs, allowing even intricate patterns to be automatic ally woven into the cloth at much the same rate as a plain length of fabric could be generated.

Son of a Silk Weaver

Born July 7, 1752, in the southern French city of Lyon, Jacquard spent much of his life in the silk textile industry. Like his parents had before him, young Joseph went to work at a silk mill in Lyon. Along with many young boys of his generation and economic status, he grew up working 10-hour days within the factory. His first task as a young worker was to serve as a draw-boy.

Sitting on a perch above the heavy, massive loom and working quickly in advance of each passage of the flying shuttle carrying the weft thread, he would lift and re-position warp threads of various colors in different spots to create the pattern desired by the Master weaver who operated the loom. This tedious and sometimes dangerous task was given to children because their smaller fingers were more capable of setting the fine silk, wool, or cotton threads used.

The Industrial Revolution heralded what would be a long, gradual shift from a farming economy, to an industrial, trade-based economy. As fewer peasants made their living off the land, they migrated to the cities, where factories sought workers in response to foreign demands for their trade goods. Throughout France, the textile industry flourished.

Poverty Leads to Revolution

Unfortunately, this new economic growth and the growth of a new entrepreneurial class came at some expense. The citizens of Lyon, as well as other industrial cities, were overworked, yet still poor and lacking food. The "curse" of the Industrial Revolution was that the upper middle-class factory owners profited from the rise in foreign trade, while the lower classes suffered crowded living conditions and little pay.

By the time Jacquard had entered adulthood, France was entering one of the most tumultuous periods of its history: the French Revolution. And in Lyons, one of the country's most densely inhabited cities, this unrest - particularly that caused by the shift in political power from the wealthy nobility into the hands of the masses - was felt by all. Changes in the status quo were happening on all levels, including political, social, economic, and technological areas.

As early as 1775, French Controller-General Anne-Robert Turgot had encouraged free trade by inhibiting the restrictive guild system and subsidizing innovations in those industries he believed would one day make France an economic rival with her nemesis, Great Britain. Following the execution of Turgot's employer, King Louis XVI, and the rise of a revolutionary government, innovations among the French citizenry continued to be encouraged and the inventive spirit was rewarded with government grants. This trend would continue following the Revolution, as Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte himself encouraged technological advances in his every-growing republic.

This encouragement by the government drew the interest of young men such as Jacquard, who had grown up and advanced to the position of mill mechanic in Lyon. Reflecting on his childhood job, Jacquard set about to find an alternative to the position of draw-boy in the silk industry.

A concept developed by fellow Frenchman Jacques de Vaucanson in 1745, that utilized a perforated roll of paper to control the weaving process, served as Jacquard's starting point. Given one of Vaucanson's looms to restore, Jacquard set to work on correcting Vaucanson's unworkable design. Absorbed by his project for several years, Jacquard created an operative prototype of his loom by 1790.

By 1793, the Revolution was in full swing, forcing Jacquard to abandon his project; instead he joined the republican lower classes in mounting their historic attack on the French nobility. After fighting alongside his fellow citizens in defense of the new French republic, Jacquard resumed his work in 1801, shortly after Napoleon's rise to power. His improved draw-loom, displayed that same year at an industrial exhibition in the Louvre in Paris, earned Jacquard a bronze medal.

Three years later, in the fall of 1803, the inventor was again summoned to Paris, this time to demonstrate a second version of his original loom design. This version had attached to the top of its frame the "Jacquard mechanism" or "Jacquard attachment," which was a device connecting the wooden loom to an interchangeable continuous roll of connected punch cards. This remarkably innovative method of "programming" a machine allowed the Jacquard loom to produce tapestries, brocades, damasks, and other intricately woven silk fabrics far more quickly than had the manual technology of the past.

The Technology of Jacquard Weaving

The innovation underlying Jacquard's loom was the use of encoded punch cards to control the action of the weaving process, allowing any desired pattern to be reproduced automatically. The required design is encoded onto a series of connected pasteboard cards as a group of punched holes, each card containing a single line of holes representing a single row of weave. Each series of rectangular cards, when connected, creates a grid of rows and columns.

Jacquard's mechanism allowed each warp thread to operate independently, much like a player piano, where each note is sounded by a hole on a music roll as it passes over a certain opening. In the Jacquard mechanism, a specific combination of holes punched in a row through an individual card allowed selected sprung rods or needles to pass through the card and pick up certain threads. The connected cards create a continuous loop allowing for repeated patterns; when all the cards have been used, the sequence begins again.

Combining any number of connected cards in a loop, Jacquard's loom was able to weave patterns of great complexity, and these became popular for tablecloths and bed coverings. In addition to textile designs featuring smallscale, repeated patterns, Jacquard became known for intricate representational coverlets featuring a single large design, woven in a variety of colors.

One remarkable example of his craft that still exists is a black-and-white silk portrait of Jacquard himself, which was woven using a strip of ten thousand cards. Also important is the course his technology would take. Jacquard's open hole/closed hole system was the first use of the binary system that would be translated into a basic computer over a century later. In addition, computer operators would refer to his concept of sequencing individual cards in a specific order to create a specific pattern, as sequencing commands to create a "program."

Innovation Gave Rise to Computer

Jacquard's invention was immediately recognized as something that would revolutionize the French textile industry. Ironically, the impoverished factory mechanic, who had also risked his life in defense of his country, would earn no money directly from his invention. Instead, in an agreement with the city of Lyon, the patent for his Jacquard mechanism reverted to the city, which declared his invention public property in 1806. Fortunately, Jacquard was awarded a state pension by Emperor Napoleon that allowed him to profit from his innovation; in addition he received royalties on each loom sold and put into operation.

Perhaps more significant that its revolution of the textile industry, Jacquard's innovative use of the punched card mechanism greatly influenced other inventors. English inventor Charles Babbage used Jacquard's technology in his development of the analytical engine, a simple form of a calculator. American statistician Herman Hollerith adopted punchcards as a means of entering data into his census collator. His collator, developed in 1890, was used through the 1960s to tabulate results of the United States census.

Repercussions of Progress

Like many labor-saving developments that occurred during the Industrial Revolution, Jacquard's technology was not immediately embraced by silk weavers and others in weaving trades. They saw it as a threat to their jobs and protested its use. As early as 1801, riots broke out in Lyon over changes to the traditional loom. In 1804, after Jacquard's revised loom was introduced, the violence escalated. In addition to trying to destroy any Jacquard looms that were in use in Lyon, attempts were made on Jacquard's life.

However, the advantages of his looms eventually won out over the opposition. In 1800, only 3,500 working looms were in use in Lyon's silk industry. Within a decade, the number of working looms in the city reached 11,000. One textile mill owner even had thousands of workers on his payroll.

By 1810, France had become competitive with its longstanding rival, Great Britain, in the textile industry. In 1819, Jacquard was awarded the Legion of Honor Cross, as well as a gold medal, for his role in his nation's economic success. During the 1820s, his name became known worldwide as use of the Jacquard loom spread to England.

Jacquard died in Oullins, France on August 7, 1834. Over 160 years later, the technology that bears his name is still in use around the world.

Books

Feldman, Anthony, and Peter Ford, Scientists and Inventors, Facts on File, 1986.

Ireland, Norma Olin, Index to Scientists of the World from Ancient to Modern Times, F.W. Faxton, 1962.

Wolf, A., History of Science and Technology in the Eighteenth Century, 1939.

Online

"Computer Pioneers," Homepage der (Institute der) Tu Graz,http://www.cis.tugraz.at/edvarch/history/jacquard.htm (March 11, 2001).

"From Weaving Looms to Programmed Calculation," Compuseum-American Computer Museum,http://www.compustory.com/Jacquard.htm (March 11, 2001).

"Joseph Jacquard," Spartacus Educational Home Page,http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/Scjacquard.htm (March 11, 2001).

"Joseph Jacquard by Erin Terkoski," Kalamazoo College website,http://kzoo.edu/~k00et01/jacquard.html (March 11, 2001).

"The Jacquard Loom," University of Rochester Department of History website,http://www.history.rochester.edu/steam/hollerith/loom.htm (March 11, 2001).

"Jacquard's Loom," Welcome to Willamette University website,http://www.willamette.edu/~jjuran/lab0.html (March 11, 2001).

Joseph Marie Jacquard
Joseph Marie Jacquard[1]
Born	7 July 1752 (1752-07-07) Lyon
Died	7 August 1834 (1834-08-08) Oullins (Rhône)
Nationality	French
Education	Worked as apprentice and learned bookbinding
Known for	Programmable loom

Joseph Marie Charles dit (called or nicknamed) Jacquard (7 July 1752 (Lyon, France) – 7 August 1834 (Oullins, France)) played an important role in the development of the earliest programmable loom (the "Jacquard loom"), which in turn played an important role in the development of other programmable machines, such as computers.

Contents 1 Early life 2 Jacquard loom 3 References 4 Further reading

Early life

First, it should be noted that Joseph Jacquard’s name was not really “Jacquard”. In his grandfather’s generation, several branches of the Charles family lived in Lyon’s Couzon-au-Mont d’Or suburb (on Lyon’s north side, along the Saône River). To distinguish the various branches, they were given nicknames; Joseph’s branch was dubbed the “Jacquard” Charles. Thus, Joseph’s grandfather was “Barthélemy Charles dit [called] Jacquard”.^[2]

Joseph Marie Charles dit Jacquard was born in Lyon, France on 7 July 1752. He was one of nine children of Jean Charles dit Jacquard, a master weaver of Lyon, and his wife, Antoinette Rive. However, only Joseph and his sister Clémence (born 7 November 1747) survived to adulthood. Although his father was a man of property, Joseph received no formal schooling and remained illiterate until he was 13. He was finally taught by his brother-in-law, Jean-Marie Barret, who ran a printing and bookselling business. Barret also introduced Joseph to learned societies and scholars.^[3]

His mother died in 1762, and when his father died in 1772, Joseph inherited his father’s house, looms and workshop as well as a vineyard and quarry in Couzon-au-Mont d’Or. Joseph then dabbled in real estate. In 1778, he listed his occupations as master weaver and silk merchant.^[4]

On 26 July 1778, Joseph married Claudine Boichon. She was a middle-class widow from Lyon who owned property and had a substantial dowry. However, Joseph soon fell deeply into debt and was brought to court.^[5] To settle his debts, he was obliged to sell his inheritance and to appropriate his wife’s dowry. Fortunately, his wife retained a house in Oullins (on Lyon’s south side, along the Rhone River), where the couple resided. On 19 April 1779, the couple had their only child, a son, Jean Marie.^[6]

By 1800, Joseph began to dabble in inventing: a treadle loom in 1800, a loom to weave fishing nets in 1803, and starting in 1804, the “Jacquard” loom, which would weave patterned silk automatically. However, none of his inventions operated well and thus were unsuccessful.^[7]

In 1801, Jacquard exhibited his invention at the industrial exhibition at Paris; and in 1803 he was summoned to Paris and attached to the Conservatoire des Arts et Metiers. A loom by Jacques de Vaucanson on display there suggested various improvements in his own, which he gradually perfected to its final state. Although his invention was fiercely opposed by the silk-weavers, who feared that its introduction, owing to the saving of labour, would deprive them of their livelihood, its advantages secured its general adoption, and by 1812 there were 11,000 Jacquard looms in use in France.^[8] The loom was declared public property in 1806, and Jacquard was rewarded with a pension and a royalty on each machine.

Jacquard died at Oullins (Rhône), 7 August 1834.^[9] Six years later a statue was erected to him in Lyon, on the site where his 1801 exhibit loom was destroyed.

Jacquard loom

Main article: Jacquard loom

Jacquard loom on display Museum of Science and Industry in Manchester, England

The Jacquard Loom is a mechanical loom that has holes punched in pasteboard, each row of which corresponds to one row of the design. Multiple rows of holes are punched on each card and the many cards that compose the design of the textile are strung together in order. It is based on earlier inventions by the Frenchmen Basile Bouchon (1725), Jean Falcon (1728) and Jacques Vaucanson (1740)^[10]

In order to discuss the Jacquard loom, some basic knowledge of weaving is necessary. In order to make a strip of cloth, parallel threads (the “warp”) are stretched across a rectangular frame. To make a plain piece of cloth, every other warp thread is raised slightly. A thread (the “weft thread”) is then passed (at a right angle to the warp) through the space (the “shed”) between the lower and the upper warp threads. The raised warp threads are then lowered and the previously lower warp threads are raised, and the weft thread is then passed through the shed in the opposite direction. The process can then be repeated indefinitely.

However, by raising different warp threads during weaving, it is possible to make fabrics of different textures or to vary the texture, or even the color, of the cloth in order to create patterns or designs. When elaborate patterns or designs were to be woven manually, selecting the warp threads that were to be raised became a slow, complicated procedure that was subject to error. Jacquard’s loom was intended to automate this process.

Jacquard was not the first man to try to automate the process of weaving. In 1725 Basile Bouchon invented an attachment for draw looms which used a broad strip of punched paper to select the warp threads that would be raised during weaving.^[11] Specifically, Bouchon’s innovation involved a row of hooks. The curved portion of each hook snagged a string that could raise one of the warp threads, whereas the straight portion of each hook pressed against the punched paper, which was draped around a perforated cylinder. Whenever the hook pressed against the solid paper, pushing the cylinder forward would raise the corresponding warp thread; whereas whenever the hook met a hole in the paper, pushing the cylinder forward would allow the hook to slip inside the cylinder and the corresponding warp thread would not be raised. Bouchon’s loom was unsuccessful because it could handle only a modest number of warp threads.^[12][13]

By 1737, a master silk weaver of Lyon, Jean Falcon, had increased the number of warp threads that the loom could handle automatically. He developed an attachment for looms in which Bouchon’s paper strip was replaced by a chain of punched cards, which could deflect multiple rows of hooks simultaneously. Like Bouchon, Falcon used a “cylinder” (actually, a four-sided perforated tube) to hold each card in place while it was pressed against the rows of hooks.^[14] His loom was modestly successful: about 40 such looms had been sold by 1762.^[15]

In 1741, Jacques de Vaucanson, a French inventor who designed and built automated mechanical toys, was appointed inspector of silk factories.^[16] Between 1747 and 1750,^[17] he tried to automate Bouchon’s mechanism. In Vaucanson's mechanism, the hooks that were to lift the warp threads were selected by long pins or "needles", which were pressed against a sheet of punched paper that was draped around a perforated cylinder. Specifically, each hook passed at a right angle through an eyelet of a needle. When the cylinder was pressed against the array of needles, some of the needles, pressing against solid paper, would move forward, which in turn would tilt the corresponding hooks. The hooks that were tilted would not be raised, so the warp threads that were snagged by those hooks would remain in place; however, the hooks that were not tilted, would be raised, and the warp threads that were snagged by those hooks would also be raised. By placing his mechanism above the loom, Vaucanson eliminated the complicated system of weights and cords (tail cords, simple, pulley box, etc.) that had been used to select which warp threads were to be raised during weaving. Vaucanson also added a ratchet mechanism to advance the punched paper each time that the cylinder was pushed against the row of hooks.^[18] However, Vaucanson’s loom was not successful.^[19]

In order to stimulate the French textile industry, which was competing with Britain’s industrialized textile industry, Napoleon Bonaparte placed large orders for Lyon’s silk, starting in 1802.^[20] In 1804,^[21] at the urging of Lyon silk merchant Gabriel Detilleu, Jacquard studied Vaucanson’s loom, which was stored at the Conservatoire des Arts et Métiers in Paris.^[22] By 1805 Jacquard had eliminated the paper strip from Vaucanson’s mechanism and returned to using Falcon’s chain of punched cards.^[23]

The potential of Jacquard’s loom was immediately recognized. On April 12, 1805, emperor Napoleon and empress Josephine visited Lyon, and during their tour, they viewed Jacquard’s new loom. On April 15, 1805, the emperor granted the patent for Jacquard’s loom to the city of Lyon. In return, Jacquard received a lifelong pension of 3,000 francs; furthermore, he received a royalty of 50 francs for each loom that was bought and used during the period from 1805 through 1811.^[24]

References

1. ^ This portrait of Jacquard was woven in silk on a Jacquard loom and required 24,000 punched cards to create. See: Anthony Hyman, ed., Science and Reform: Selected Works of Charles Babbage (Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 1989), page 298. It is in the collection of the Science Museum in London, England. (Delve (2007), page 99.) See also: History of Science.com: "The Most Famous Image in the Early History of Computing" at: http://www.historyofscience.com/G2I/timeline/index.php?category=Computers+%26+the+Human+Brain .
2. ^ Janet Delve, "Joseph Marie Jacquard: Inventor of the Jacquard Loom," IEEE Annals of the History of Computing, vol. 29, no. 4, pages 98-102 (October-December 2007); see especially page 98. See also: Jean Huchard, "Entre la légende et la réalité: La famille de Joseph Marie Charles dit Jacquard" [Between legend and reality: The family of Joseph Marie Charles known as Jacquard], part 1, Bulletin Municipal Officiel de la Ville de Lyon, no. 5309, 23 January 2000.
3. ^ Delve (2007), page 98.
4. ^ Delve (2007), page 98. Jacquard’s occupation at this time is problematic because by 1780 most silk weavers did not work independently; instead, they worked for wages from silk merchants, and Jacquard was not registered as a silk merchant in Lyon (Delve (2007), page 99).
   
   There is some confusion about Jacquard’s early work history. British economist Sir John Bowring met Jacquard, who told Bowring that at one time he had been a maker of straw hats. (See: Alfred Barlow, The History and Principles of Weaving by Hand and by Power (London, England: Sampson Low, Marston, Searle, & Rivington, 1878), page 144. Available on-line at: http://books.google.com/books?id=4xZW0vYWydIC&pg=PA140&ie=ISO-8859-1&output=html .) Eymard claimed that before becoming involved in the weaving of silk, Jacquard was a type-founder (a maker of printers’ type), a soldier, a bleacher (blanchisseur) of straw hats, and a lime burner (a maker of lime for mortar). (See: Paul Eymard, Historique du Métier Jacquard (Lyon, France: Imprimerie de Barret, 1863), page 9. Reprinted in: Annales des Sciences Physiques et Naturelles d'Agriculture et d'Industrie (Lyon, France), 3rd series, vol. 7, pages 34-56 (1863). Available on-line at: http://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k108292v.image.f1.pagination .) However, Eymard doesn‘t cite his source for this information. Barlow claimed that before marrying, Jacquard had worked for a bookbinder, a type-founder, and a maker of cutlery. After marrying, Jacquard tried cutlery making, type-founding, and weaving. (See: Alfred Barlow (1878), page 140.) However, Barlow doesn't cite any sources for that information. Ballot stated that Jacquard initially helped his father operate his loom, but the work proved too arduous, so Jacquard was placed first with a bookbinder and then with a maker of printers' type. (See: Charles Ballot (1913), page 39.)
5. ^ Barlow claims that after Jacquard's father died, Jacquard started a figure-weaving business but failed and lost all his wealth. However, Barlow cites no sources to support his claim. See: Barlow (1878), page 140.
6. ^ Delve (2007), page 98. Beyond his name and his date of birth, nothing is known about Jacquard's son. Charles Ballot stated that after the rebellion of Lyon in 1793 was suppressed, Jacquard and his son escaped from the city by joining the revolutionary army. They fought together in the Rhine campaign of 1795, serving in the Rhone-and-Loire battalion under General Jean Charles Pichegru. Jacquard's son was killed outside of Heidelberg. However, Ballot repeated rumors and was a sloppy historian (e.g., he stated that Jacquard's wife, Claudette Boichon, was the daughter of Antoine-Hélon Boichon, a master swordsmith, whereas Claudette was a widow who had been married to a Mr. Boichon before she married Jacquard). See: Charles Ballot, “L’Évolution du Métier Lyonnais” in Revue d'histoire de Lyon: Études, Documents, Bibliographie (Lyon, France: A. Rey et Co., 1913), vol. 2, page 40. Available on-line at: http://books.google.com/books?id=FijY7LHUqEAC&pg=PA40&lpg=PA49&ots=OKNHAjsbBH&ie=ISO-8859-1&output=html .
7. ^ Delve (2007), page 99.
8. ^ This claim has been challenged: Initially few Jacquard looms were sold because of problems with the punched card mechanism. Only after 1815 — after Jean Antoine Breton had solved the problems with the punched card mechanism — did sales of looms increase. See: Jean Huchard, Bulletin Municipal de la Ville de Lyon, numbers: 5219 ("Entre la légende et la réalité: Les tribulations de la mécanique de Joseph Marie Jacquard" [Between legend and reality: The problems of the Joseph Marie Jacquard mechanism]), 3 May 1998; and 5220 ("Entre la légende et la réalité: Le véritable inventeur de la mécanique dite à la Jacquard" [Between legend and reality: The true inventor of the so-called Jacquard mechanism]), 10 May 1998. See also page 100 of Janet Delve's article cited above (footnote 1).
9. ^ Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition
10. ^ "Computer History Museum". http://www.coe.uh.edu/courses/cuin7317/students/museum/slong.html. Retrieved 2008-11-24. 
11. ^ Kreindl claimed that in or before 1740, a member of the Ortner family of Muhlviertel in Upper Austria independently invented a mechanism similar to Bouchon's, except that instead of using perforated paper, the mechanism was controlled by a strip of canvas to which pegs had been attached. See: Fritz Kreindl (8 May 1935) "Jacquards Prinzip bereits 200 Jahre alt?" [Jacquard principle already 200 years old?], Sonderdruck aus Melliand Textilberichte, Heidelberg 2, pages 1-2.
12. ^ Abbott Payson Usher, A History of Mechanical Invention, revised edition (Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1954), page 290.
13. ^ Detailed illustrations of Bouchon’s mechanism and explanations of its operation can be found in: T. F. Bell, Jacquard Weaving and Designing (London, England: Longmans, Green, and Co., 1895), pages 18-20. Available on-line at: http://books.google.com/books?id=qvDILu3TeIEC&pg=PA18&ie=ISO-8859-1&output=html .
14. ^ Detailed illustrations of Falcon’s mechanism and explanations of its operation can be found in: Bell (1895), pages 19 - 22. Available on-line at: http://books.google.com/books?id=qvDILu3TeIEC&pg=PA19&ie=ISO-8859-1&output=html .
15. ^ Usher (1954), page 291
16. ^ Barlow (1878), page 146.
17. ^ Liliane Pérez, “Inventing in a world of guilds: Silk fabrics in eighteenth-century Lyon” in Guilds, Innovation, and the European Economy, 1400-1800, Stephan R. Epstein and Maarten Roy Prak, ed.s, (Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 2008), page 242. Available on-line at: http://books.google.com/books?id=fXlALljcyMkC&pg=PA242&lpg=PA238&ots=xGwM1DiENj&dq=Vaucanson+soie&ie=ISO-8859-1&output=html .
18. ^ Usher (1954), page 292. Bell (1895), pages 22-23. Barlow (1878), page 141. Photograph of a replica of Vaucanson’s loom at the Conservatoire des Arts et Métiers in Paris: http://www.rutherfordjournal.org/images/hollerith4.png .
19. ^ Vaucanson’s mechanism was not successful probably because, like Bouchon’s mechanism, it could not control enough warp threads -- and hence it could not weave patterns that were sufficiently elaborate -- to justify the cost of the mechanism. See: Pérez (2008), page 242.
20. ^ Delve (2007), page 100.
21. ^ Eymard (1863), page 11.
22. ^ Delve (2007), p. 99.
23. ^ Bell (1895), page 23.
24. ^ Delve (2007), p. 100.

Further reading

• Essinger, James (2004). Jacquard's Web: How a Hand-Loom Led to the Birth of the Information Age. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 

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