Singer Sewing Machine Company

The South Bend Singer plant was established in 1868. Sewing machines used to be housed in wooden cabinets and the cabinet is what was made here in South Bend.  The South Bend plant in 1868 produced 1,000 cabinets a week. Twenty years later, the plant was producing 10,000 sets per day, while over 2,000 people were employed in various departments.  The acres and acres of hardwood trees found around the countryside outside South Bend provided the material in which the sewing machine cabinets could be easily and cheaply produced.

The South Bend plant was originally located on East Madison and North Emrick Streets (now East Madison and Niles Avenue) on the East Race. The plant increased in size so much that in a few years it became necessary to move. Singer Sewing Machine Company then relocated to Olive and Western Avenue in South Bend (one factory building remains—the Mary Crest Building on Western Avenue). By 1901 the company occupied a vast lot that allowed for increased production. However, after a somewhat unsuccessful try at World War II wartime production the company never again really prospered in South Bend.  With the increase in retail clothing production, women found it easier, and more economic, to buy clothes rather than make them for their family.  This, and other poor business decisions doomed the Singer Sewing Machine Company in South Bend, which eventually closed in the 1960s.

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