Thanks Mary!
Jan, I got this email this morning...this is what John had to say about Half Pint:
Hi Charlee,
That's magnificent. Thank you so much. And your contributors.
Jan's machine is super cute. The only reference to the short-base portable I've seen is a 1904 UK advertisement. There is so little written about W&W and no production records - some pretty trade cards and that's it. It's hard to believe considering it was the market leader in the early days,
The short-base D9 is definitely a 20th century product and only produced for only a few years. It is clear that, when Singer took over in 1905, it streamlined the product line down to a full size portable and full size treadle; though the treadle could come with 1, 3, 5, or 7 drawers, or in an enclosed 'parlour cabinet'.
You will notice a smooth vertical groove to the right of Jan's machine's wooden base. This, like the holes in the bases of old Singers, was to provide a route for the treadle belt if the owner wanted to mount it (complete) in a treadle. With that style of base, you had the option. There was another version of the (short) base which doesn't have the groove and was for hand use only.
All the short-base machines seem to have used the same decal set, with side-by-side Ws. The contemporary long base had two Ws superimposed and a large '9'. There are a couple of exceptions, but that appears to be the rule. The regular horizontal arm decal wouldn't fit on the shorter arm so W&W put its name in "Gothic type", instead of the usual, rather wide, slab-serif face.
Always good engineering, Wheeler & Wilson; I like the way they re-located the captive thread post so that it folds behind the arm, not above - reducing the overall height. And interesting that Jan showed it next to a 221. Not only did Singer introduce a 221-style bobbin (well, almost identical), but they also abandoned the captive thread post and mounted the post on top of the arm cover plate. Another feature that was eventually to be found on the Featherweights.
It's often overlooked but a lot of the FW - the stitch-forming mechanism and the feed - is a development of W&W 's inventions. Even the idea of having the arm cover plate on top of the arm was W&W's. Singer had always had their's at the rear.
I think Singer bought a bargain.
Best wishes,
John