"Jan Ernst Matzeliger(September 15,1852-August 24,1889)

He was born in Dutch Guiana (now known as Surinam) in South America.His daddy was a Dutch engineer and his his mama was born in Dutch Guiana and
was of African ancestry.His daddy had been sent to Surinam by the Dutch
government to oversee the work going on in the South American country.At an early age,he he showed a remarkable ability to repair complex machinery and often did so when he turned 19,he decided to venture away from home to explore other parts of the world.For two years he worked aboard on an East Indian merchant ship able to visit several countries.In 1873,Jan decided to stay in the United States for a while,landing in Pennsylvania.Although he spoke very little English,he was befriended by some African American residents who were active in a local church and took pity on him.Because he was good with his hands and mechanically inclined,he was able to get small jobs in order to earn a living.At some point he began working for a cobbler and became interested in making shoes.At that time more than half  of the shoes produced in the United States came from the small town of Lynn,Massachusetts.Still unable to speak more than rudimentary English,Jan had a difficult time finding work in Lynn.After considerable time,he was able to begin working in a shoe factory.He operated a McKay sole-sewing machine which was used to attached different parts of a shoe together.Unfortunately,no machines existed that could attach the upper part of shoe to the sole.As such,attaching the upper part of a shoe had to be done by hand.The people who were able to sew the parts of the shoe together were called "hands lasters" and expert one were able to produce about 50 pairs of shoes in a 10 hour work day.They were held in high esteem d were able to charge a high Price for their services,especially after they banded together and formed a union called the Company of Shoemakers.Because the hand lasters were able to charge so much money,a pair of shoes was very expensive to purchase.Hand lasters were confident that they would continue to be able to demand high sums of money for their services saying"...no matter if the sewing machine is a wonderful machine.No man could build a machine that will last shoes and take away jobs of lasters,unless he can make a machine that has fingers like a laster-and that is impossible."Jan decided they were wrong.
After working all day Jan took classes at night to learn English.Soon,he was able to read well enough to study books on physics and mechanical science.This enable him to a number of inventions.Lacking a sufficient money,he was unable to patent these inventions and watched helplessly as other people claimed to have created the devises and received the financial rewards they brought.Jan did not despair over these situations because he was already thinking of a more important invention-the shoe laster.
Watching hand laster all day,Jan began understanding how they were able to
join the upper parts of a shoe to a sole.At night he sat devising methods for imitating the mannerisms of the hand lasters and sketched out rough drawings of a machine that might work in the same manner.
Soon,Jan began putting together a crude working model of his invention.Lacking the proper materials,he used whatever scraps he could find,including cigar boxes,dicarded pieces of wood scrap wire,nails,and paper.After six months,Jan felt he was right on track but knew he needed better materials in order to take the next steps.
He attempted to keep his invention a secret people found out,including the expert hand lasters he was trying to "compete"with.These people criticized and ridiculzed him an tried to dissuade him pursuing his goal.Jan considered on,and decided to try to raise money in order to improve his working model.He was offered $50.00 to sell the device he had created up to that point but turned it down,knowing that if people were interested in buying,he was on the right track.As he improved the device,other offers of money came in,some as high as $1,5000.000.Jan could not bear part with the device he had put so much work into creating so held out until he reached a deal to sell 66% interest in the device to two investors,retailing the other third interest to himself.With the new influx of cash,Jan finished his second and third models of the machine.At this point he applied for a patent for the device.Because no one could believe that anyone could create a machine which could duplicate the work of an expert laster the patent office dispatched a representative to Lynn Massachusetts to see the device in action.In March 1883,the United States patent office issued a patent to Jan for his "Lasting Machine."Within two years,he had perfected the machine to that point it could produce up to 700 pairs of shoes each day (as compared to 50 per day for a hand laster.)Jan would only enjoy his success for a short time,he was afflicted with tuberculosis in 1886.