This machine came to Sew Much Hope from one of our service missionaries. It had belonged to his grandmother, and when his family offered it to us they said that nobody wanted it. We still cannot make sense of that. It is the kind of thing most families would build a shelf for.
It is not going overseas. A few machines arrive carrying more history than we are willing to put on a shipping pallet, and this is one of them. It stays with us. It comes along to events, to schools and to parks, where people get to put their hands on it while we tell them where it has been.
The family wrote the story down and sent it along with the machine. Here it is in their words.
This sewing machine holds a deep and cherished place in my family’s history. It originally belonged to my grandmother, Lily Elizabeth Smith, who was born in England in 1895. She was the fourth of eight daughters born to a modest family. Tragedy struck early in her life when her father passed away at a young age, leaving her mother alone to raise all eight girls during a time of limited opportunity and great hardship.
The family struggled financially, and with so many mouths to feed, there was no room for formal education. None of the girls, including my grandmother, were able to attend school. Instead, they were required to work from a young age to help provide for the household. Life was difficult, and every penny mattered.
When my grandmother married, she and her husband were determined to build a better future. They worked hard and saved carefully. One of their proudest accomplishments in those early years was the purchase of this very sewing machine. To some, it may look like just an old machine, but to our family, it was a symbol of perseverance, hope, and survival. My grandmother used it not only to mend and create clothing for her family but also as a way to earn extra income. Through her skill and dedication, she clothed her family and helped provide for their needs.
This machine was especially important to my mother, who was Lily’s only child. Every stitch sewn into her clothes was an act of love and sacrifice. My grandmother poured her heart into everything she made, and the sewing machine became an essential part of our family’s daily life.
In 1945, after World War II, my mother married an American soldier and immigrated to the United States as a war bride. It was a bittersweet moment for my grandmother. Although she was proud of her daughter’s new beginning, she was heartbroken at the thought of being separated from her only child. So, in a courageous and loving decision, my grandparents packed their belongings—including the sewing machine—and followed my mother to America.
I grew up in the late 1940s, and some of my earliest memories are of watching my grandmother work tirelessly at that sewing machine. She made clothes for me and my two older brothers, always ensuring we had something warm to wear, no matter how tight money was. I remember the rhythmic sound of the machine’s pedal, the gentle hum of the needle, and my grandmother’s focused expression as she worked. It wasn’t just sewing—it was love in its purest form.
That machine became a central piece of our home. It had already seen a lot in its lifetime—two world wars, economic hardship, transatlantic journeys, and the strength of a woman who refused to give up. Through it all, it kept going, just like my grandmother. She used it until the very end of her life, always making sure her family was taken care of.
Now, many decades later, this sewing machine remains in our family as a treasured heirloom. It represents not just fabric and thread, but history, endurance, and devotion. It is a symbol of a woman who never had much in the way of material wealth but gave everything she had to her family. The machine is a reminder of the strength and resilience of women like Lily Elizabeth Smith—women who quietly and selflessly shaped the lives of those they loved.
It is my heartfelt hope that this sewing machine continues to bring warmth and fond memories to whoever may be fortunate enough to have it in the future. May it inspire appreciation for the sacrifices made before us and remind us of the love that can be passed down not just through generations, but through the things we use and cherish every day.
Whenever you place your hands on this machine, take a moment to think of Lily Elizabeth Smith. Her hands once worked these same levers and threads, creating garments stitched with care and a mother’s love. Let her memory live on in every stitch, and may her legacy of kindness, strength, and devotion never be forgotten.
There is one more piece, and it is the part that stops people at events.
During the war, families in England who did not live close to a public air raid shelter were issued one for the back garden. Lily’s family had one, and when the sirens went they went out to it. One night the bombing came so close they were certain the house had been hit. The next morning they found out that it had. A bomb had come through the roof, down through the floor and into the ground underneath, and it never went off.
So when you put your hands on this machine, you are touching a house in England that a bomb passed straight through and did not take down.
Every machine that comes to us has a history like this one. Most of them we never get to read. Lily’s came with hers written down, and whoever sits down at it next gets to add to it.
