Button (fastener)

“ What is the use of my talking if people never do what I advise them to do? When her husband ridiculed her, she made up her mind she would make a better collar-button, and when a woman makes up her mind “she will,” and does not say anything about it, she does it. It was that New England woman who invented the snap button which you can find anywhere now. It was first a collar-button with a spring cap attached to the outer side. Any of you who wear modern waterproofs know the button that simply pushes together, and when you unbutton it you simply pull it apart. ”

“ Buttons are not always stamped so carefully as they ought to be:—caution your Button Maker, that you will not take any impressions that are imperfect: you may be charged a trifle more per Dozen, if you will have every Button as perfect as the Proof Specimen. ”

“ But deliberately vicious buttons are rare. The fact is, few buttons would go to the bad, were it not for the heartless indifference of their owners. Too often a headstrong young button, that might easily have been saved had it been brought up short the moment it showed signs of looseness, is allowed to reach the end of its rope, fall, and be utterly lost. ”

“ Fig. 122.—Diagram showing how to connect a Bell, Battery, and Push-Button. A little experimenting with the bell will soon enable one to find its best adjustment. Figure 122 shows how to connect a bell to a battery and a push-button. A push-button is simply a small switch which closes the circuit when pressed. Do not make the armature spring too weak, or the hammer will move very slowly and with very little life. Each time that the armature moves toward the magnets, it should barely touch the iron cores before the ball strikes the bell. ”

“ By another press the edge was scalloped, and by a third press the open work was effected. The next process was that of so pressing each disc to such an extent that the scalloped edges of two might meet, and thus form a round button of pretty design when united, and a shank fastened in the centre of one of the blanks.
Military buttons, like many others, are made of two discs of metal, the impression on the outer ones being produced by a sharp blow in a stamp, the under ones having two holes pierced in them for the shanks, which are put through and bent flat on the inside. ”

“ The index-hands of the two apparatus thereupon begin their movement simultaneously, and only stop when the pressure is removed from the button and the current is consequently interrupted. H is a ratchet-wheel, which, like the key-board, is insulated from the rest of the apparatus. The button, K, located over each of the dials, serves to bring the index-needles back to their position under the cross shown in Fig. 12. The key, X, serves for winding up the clock-work movement. ”

“ The battery is set in a bracket under which a reflector extends downward to throw the light on the dial of the watch and to protect the eyes from the direct light. The entire stand and bracket are made from sheet metal. The base is formed to make a tray to hold pins and collar buttons. It is not necessary to seek in the darkness for a push button or switch, as in ordinary devices, but a light pressure with the palm of the hand will make the lamp glow. ”

“ This can be simply made by threading a large button on a string, so that when the ends are knotted together it makes a loop about twelve to fifteen inches long. Keeping the button in the middle of the doubled length of string insert the first and second fingers of each hand into the looped ends, and rapidly whirl the button round till the string gets a considerable twist on it. Now by alternately slacking and tightening the [81] string the button will whizz round with a slight humming noise. If a piece of tin with notched edges (as in Figure 51 of a windmill) is used, it will hum very loud. ”

“ If the speed is open, if the color is careless, if the selection of a strong scent is not awkward, if the button holder is held by all the waving color and there is no color, not any color. If there is no dirt in a pin and there can be none scarcely, if there is not then the place is the same as up standing.
This is no dark custom and it even is not acted in any such a way that a restraint is not spread. That is spread, it shuts and it lifts and awkwardly not awkwardly the centre is in standing. ”

“ The buttons are now cast from a mixture of brass and tin; sometimes a small proportion of zinc is added, which is found useful in causing the metal to flow freely into the mould, and make a sharp casting. When the buttons are cast, they are cleaned from the sand by brushing; they are then broken asunder, and carried to a second workman at the lathe, who inserts the shank of a button into a chuck of a proper figure, in which it is retained by the back centre of the lathe being pressed against the button with a spring. ”

“ While to neglect buttons is most reprehensible, there is such a thing as showing them too much indulgence. For buttons must not be coddled: when toyed with, they droop.
Tender-hearted women, actuated by sympathy and not realizing the consequences of what they were doing, have been known to pamper buttons. Because a button has a pleasant, open countenance, one of these misguided persons will support it on her costume in idleness. She may even surround herself with a retinue of glittering sycophants that never knew a buttonhole—great saucerlike hangers-on, lolling on their stems ”

“ In an old play a man threatens a country lad, “I’ll make your buttons fly.” The lad replies, “All my buttons is loops.” Some garments, especially leather ones, like doublets, which were cumbersome to button, were secured by loops. For instance, in spatterdashes, a row of holes was set on one side, and of loops on the other. To fasten them, one must begin at the lower loop, pass this through the first hole, then put the second loop through that first loop and the second hole, and so on till the last loop was fastened to the breeches by buckle and strap or large single button. ”

“ About two years after the father-vest-second-button age, which would land me in the father-vest-third-and-a-half-button stage, I fell to wondering about buttons in a scientific way. Buttons were awkward. The world, I knew, had been going on for hundreds of centuries and men had discovered no more graceful fashion of fastening their clothes together than by these round discs, dangling ridiculously from clothes and yet anchored there with an amount of pains out of all proportion to the achievement. ”

“ No one has ever yet been known to recover the suspender button he has once really lost; and my notion of it is simply that the minute a metal suspender button comes off the clothes of anybody in all the whole universe, it immediately flies up through the air and space to Twinkleville, which is nothing more than a huge magnet, and lies there until somebody picks it up and tries to sell it. ”

“ No matter how many times you press the button, though, the value of the button press will remain constant: the amount by which pressing the up arrow varies the speed doesn’t depend on how many times you’ve pressed the button, or on how fast the treadmill is already turning. Whether you’re walking slowly at one mile per hour or sprinting at 15 miles per hour, pressing that button will always result in a change of .1 mile per hour. ”

“ Thus a button is produced at an extraordinary economical rate, and with marvellous ease, which, while comparing the facility of its origin to that of the porcelain, possesses the superlative qualities of being comparable with one made with the properties and strength of iron or other metal, and in imitation of bronze, ivory, cameo, and is, indeed, a substitute for any other, and the very best material or thing ever used for button making. ”

“ In old times, a ring or a button would be tied by a boy to one end of a long piece of thread, which he would then hold at the other end, letting the button hang within a glass, or over a piece of slate-pencil, or sealing-wax, or a nail ”

“ This can be readily proved by joining together the two yoke ends and the two armature ends of the spool wires. Then pass the current through these two joined connections.
Fig. 16 Fig. 17 Fig. 18 Fig. 19 The Push Button.
Push buttons, or pushes, are made in a variety of forms, with metal, wood, hard rubber, or porcelain bases.
Fig. 16 has a metal base, and is suitable for a front door.
Fig. 17 is a wooden pear push, and is attached at the end of a cord which has the two conductors braided in it, each, however, having its own insulation. ”

“ The neck, or collet, of the button is japanned after being stamped and cut. The hollow between the neck and shell is filled with millboard. When the parts are put together and pressed the button is brought into shape, and its several parts are consolidated.
It was in the year 1841 that Mr. John Aston made the first three-fold linen button—that is, a button formed of a linen covering and a ring of metal, so put together that both sides and centre were completely covered with separate pieces of linen, and thus produced being quite flat. ”

“ But where a button has been pushed down, its lever catches the arm, lifting its spring away from the teeth of the wheel. So long as the key remains down, the arrested arm makes a short metallic circuit by its contact, and no currents pass into the line, for they take the shortest path. The key is raised only when another is depressed, and then the arm and the pointer immediately resume their revolution until they again become stationary at the letter corresponding with the key which has been pushed down. ”

“ Being screwed up near the door pull, a wire is run from the latter and fastened to lever L. When the pull is drawn out the lever L turns on a pivot and a projection presses the insulated spring S against the metal base B. The circuit of the bell and battery being thus closed, the bell rings.
Fig. 21 Indicating Push Button. ”

“ Although, as in previous papers, I have conducted my readers in paths not usual to girls and young women, I hope that my description of button-making will interest a considerable number, and teach them to think more of buttons and how they are made and by whom made than they have ever done before. ”

“ Many a household manufactured its own buttons. They were made of cloth cut round, and of as many ply as was necessary for firmness. Thick, heavy button-hole stitches were worked all around the edge with thread coarser than the cloth of which the button was made, and when these were stitched on firmly there was no worry about the washerwoman’s breaking or washing them off. ”

“ They collect buttons the same way, for games like BUTTONS IN THE RING; only the buttons must be of metal, of brass or steel; they must ring like money when you throw them on the pavement: that’s the test. All other buttons are simply “toot”—not worth talking about. The best metal buttons are commissionaires’ buttons; they’re called “raileys”, and a good railey is worth four or even six ordinary metal ones, while a bad one (with a loose shank, for instance) will fetch only two. Many boys are able to stitch themselves full of these buttons, for use in games ”

“ Buttons consists of seven or eight buttons being thrown as near as possible a specific line on the pavement. The one who gets nearest goes in first. He stands on the curb, takes his nicker, and aims it at a button agreed upon by the rest. If he hits it, he gets the button and has another turn; if he misses, the next boy goes in, and the one who has got the most buttons is the winner. This game is called Nicking. Another consists in putting all the buttons close together on a line and hitting one out of the line without touching the others. ”

“ Oftentimes a single electric bell may be connected in a circuit so that it can be operated from more than one push button. These push buttons are usually located in entirely different parts of the building and it is necessary to have some means of determining the particular push button that was pressed and caused the bell to operate. The electric annunciator is a device that will indicate or record the various calls or signals that may be sent over the circuits to which the annunciator is connected. ”

“ All the telephones described above do not require any battery whatever, and for ordinary purposes are all that can be desired, both for loudness and distinctness. By reason of its simplicity of operation, the 'push-button magneto' (Fig. 29) type of instrument was popular during its brief existence. ”

“ For this reason it would require a comparatively very great supply of energy to the button to maintain it at incandescence with a steady potential. The higher the frequency of the electric impulses the more economically can the button be maintained at incandescence. One of the chief reasons why this is so, is, I believe, that with impulses of very high frequency there is less exchange of the freely movable carriers around the electrode and this means, that in the bulb the heated matter is better confined to the neighborhood of the button. ”

“ It is not a bad method, either, to stitch a small button at the back of the neck of the jacket, upon the inner side, upon which the collar can be secured, fastening the cuffs in the same manner to buttons attached to the inner portion of each sleeve. In short, anything in the shape of a device which will check the unseemly habit of using a multiplicity of pins, may be regarded as a welcome innovation, and at once adopted. ”

“ A button formed from a single sheet of metal, free from sutrues, of a convenient shape, and uniting strength with lightness, would seem to come fairly within the meaning of the patent laws. The tools to be used in making the button are not described, but they are not claimed to be new; and the method or process of manufacture is described with sufficient particularity to enable any one skilled in the art to follow it. ”

“ An ordinary electric push button can be used for a floor push button by placing it on a bracket or shelf attached to a joist, as shown, and using a nail for the extension push. A 1/4-in. hole is bored through the floor, also through a small piece of wood fastened beneath the floor, at the right place to direct the nail so that it will strike directly upon the small black knob of the push button. ”