Early Kohler Sewing Machine
 

I picked up this little half size machine today and am trying to identify it. There is a silver plate that reads "Kohler Maschine, Bestes, Deutsches Fabrikat". The only number I find is below the bobbin winder and is 609249. If I shine a light on the arm I can barely read "Emil Forst?, Luben" (maybe Forstry). It is very similar to the Tryer model on this page: http://www.sewmuse.co.uk/Kohler%20sewing%20machine.htm
This says that Kohler, along with Dietrich and Winselmann, started a sewing machine company in 1871 at Altenburg, Germany. Eventually Kohler established his own company. - There are chips of mother of pearl inlaid into the bed of the machine that circle the gold deals. The seller also gave me a case top that she said went with the machine but I don't think it is from a sewing machine (maybe an olde typewriter?). There is another silver plate by the bobbin winder that has "QLT 339" at the top followed by a chart of numbers (Nos. 10, 90-150; 11, 60-90; 12, 40-60; 13, 30-40; 14, 20-30; 15, 10-20). When I did a Google search I found a number of items in Russian listing similar machines for sale in Rubles! - This is about as far as I've been able to get. Any further info you folks might have would be greatly appreciated.

love the machine. Know nothing about it but love it. Will watch to find out about it!
peace

There is a lovely lady named Donna Kohler who teaches treadling- I'm sure you can find her website by googling. I love the cover- it is from a typewriter.

Love the embellishments on the machine and of course the machine.

Joyce, I'm very happy for your getting the machine. Your machine looks a lot like my Gritzner hand crank machine that I got last month. They were modeled after the Singer 12. Does yours have the tension on the front of the machine? Do you have a shuttle and shuttle bobbin with it? The shuttle bobbin winder looks like mine does, rather than the pictures of the Singer 12's that I have seen. Don't know about the top though. Mine is in a wooden base and has the top to match. It looks like yours was in a cabinet of some kind with the hinges on the back side of the machine. I'm guessing that yours was a treadle machine. It doesn't have a hand crank as far as I can see. I'm thinking that the metal rectangle with all the numbers is something about what needle to use with what weight thread, but could be wrong. I am unable to find much about mine either. Maybe if I spoke German and could go on some German sites, I could find out more about my machine. I'm thinking mine is from the late 1800's to early 1900's, maybe 1890 from what I saw of one on the net that they dated as 1890. But then too, I could be wrong... I hope you can get a lot of enjoyment out of your machine. Mine has the cutest little 'tick, tick, tick' sound when I hand crank it. AND it has a great stitch!!!

Translation: Kohler Machine, Best, German Make (Manufacture) The other is someone's name.

What an awesome machine.