Thanks Jon. That’s interesting.
I would say that the “hay-day” for selling sewing machine vises came much earlier that 1951, like maybe in the mid and late 40s? Fifteen dollars for a gadget to hold a sewing machine while you rehabilitated it was a lot of money back then, wouldn’t you think? Twenty-six dollars for one with all of the bells and whistles could have possibly been even further out of reach. An independent shop (who Brewer primarily sold to) would have to rehab a great many machines to recoup the cost for any of the “Repair Jacks”, even if your shop just had one. An increase from $5 to $15 in forty-one years was definitely something worth noting, but with the war disrupting the supply of machines, maybe expected. With or without the devices, machine rehab probably saved a lot of small shops.
The 1951 catalog that I have showing the three different models available was possibly an attempt to get rid of the remaining stock when rebuilding machines was less of a necessity. I don’t know that for a fact, but by 1951, new models were out and the reconditioning was probably coming to an end. Although, evidently Brewer sold them all, because they don’t offer them that I can see today....
CD in Oklahoma