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AT A GLANCE:

In 1801, Joseph Marie Jacquard, a silk-weaver, invented an improved textile loom.
The Jacquard loom was the first machine to use punched card. These punched cards controlled the weaving, enabling an ordinary workman to produce the most beautiful patterns in a style previously accomplished only with patience, skill, and hard work.

Invention: Jacquard Loom in 1801

Function: noun / a weaving loom
named after its inventor

Definition: Jacquard's loom mechanism is controlled by recorded patterns of holes in a string of cards, and allows, what is now known as, the Jacquard weaving of intricate patterns.

Patent: The French government claimed the loom to be public property.

Inventor: Joseph Marie Jacquard

Criteria: First to invent. First practical. Entrepreneur.

Birth: July 7, 1752 in Lyon, France

Death: August 7, 1834 in Oullins, France

Nationality: French
Jacquared Loom from weaving lab of BUTex

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he Jacquard loom is a mechanical loom, invented by Joseph Marie Jacquard, first demonstrated in 1801, that simplifies the process of manufacturing textiles with complex patterns such as brocade, damask and matelasse.[1][2] The loom was controlled by a "chain of cards", a number of punched cards, laced together into a continuous sequence.[3] Multiple rows of holes were punched on each card and each row of punched holes corresponded to one row of the design. Several such paper cards, generally white in color, can be seen in the images below. Chains, like the much later paper tape, allowed sequences of any length to be constructed, not limited by the size of a card.

It is based on earlier inventions by the Frenchmen Basile Bouchon (1725), Jean Baptiste Falcon (1728) and Jacques Vaucanson (1740)[4] A static display of a Jacquard loom is the centrepiece of the Musée des Tissus et des Arts Décoratifs[5] in Lyon. Live displays of a Jacquard loom are available at a few private museums around Lyon.

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Principles of operation:

Each position in the card corresponds to a "Bolus" hook, which can either be raised or stopped dependent on whether the hole is punched out of the card or the card is solid. The hook raises or lowers the harness, which carries and guides the warp thread so that the weft will either lie above or below it. The sequence of raised and lowered threads is what creates the pattern. Each hook can be connected to a number of threads, allowing more than one repeat of a pattern. A loom with a 400 hook head might have four threads connected to each hook, resulting in a fabric that is 1600 warp ends wide with four repeats of the weave going across.

The term "Jacquard loom" is a misnomer. It is the "Jacquard head" that adapts to a great many dobby looms such as the "Dornier" brand that allow the weaving machine to then create the intricate patterns often seen in Jacquard weaving.

Jacquard looms, whilst relatively common in the textile industry, are not as ubiquitous as dobby looms which are usually faster and much cheaper to operate. However, unlike jacquard looms, they are not capable of producing so many different weaves from one warp. Modern jacquard looms are controlled by computers in place of the original punched cards, and can have thousands of hooks.

The threading of a Jacquard loom is so labor-intensive that many looms are threaded only once. Subsequent warps are then tied in to the existing warp with the help of a knotting robot which ties each new thread on individually. Even for a small loom with only a few thousand warp ends the process of re-threading can take days

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Importance in computing:

The Jacquard loom was the first machine to use punched cards to control a sequence of operations. Although it did no computation based on them, it is considered an important step in the history of computing hardware.[9] The ability to change the pattern of the loom's weave by simply changing cards was an important conceptual precursor to the development of computer programming. Specifically, Charles Babbage planned to use cards to store programs in his Analytical engine. In the late 19th century, Herman Hollerith took the idea of using punched cards to store information a step further when he created a punched card tabulating machine which was used in the 1890 U.S. Census.

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Milestones:

CAPS: Jaquard, Joseph Marie Jacquard, ARY, loom, Jacquard, loom, weaving, computer, SIP, history, biography, inventor, invention, story, facts.

Joseph-Marie Jacquard, born in Lyons, France in 1752, was born into a family of weavers. The weaving profession was a long and tedious process, often taking long periods of time to produce the fine woven fabrics of that era. When his parents passed away, Joseph inherited the family weaving business.

The amount of time that was put into such a profession almost eliminated the profit of the fabric, so Joseph saw it fit to invent a loom that would design such patterns automatically. Previously, in order to make the intricate patterns of the fabric, there was a need for a drawboy, the least glamorous of any position in the weaving industry.

The drawboy was to sit inside the loom and lift or move a number of threads according to the directions of the master weaver. After lifting or moving the threads, the shuttle pulled a thread through, showing only where the master weaver instructed. Joseph began his invention, and was interrupted by the French Revolution, and then afterwards completed his invention in 1801. He presented his invention in Paris in 1804, and was awarded a medal and patent for his design, however the French government claimed the loom to then be public property, giving Jacquard a slight royalty and a small pension.

Jacquard’s invention helped not only the textile industry, but helped in the advance of technology. The Jacquard loom not only cut back on the amount of human labor, but also allowed for patterns to now be stored on cards and to be utilized over and over again to achieve the same product.

The idea behind the Jacquard-loom was a system of punch cards and hooks. The cards were made very thick and had rectangular holes punched in them. The hooks and needles used in weaving were guided by these holes in the cardboard. When the hooks came into contact with the card they were held stationary unless it encountered one of the punched holes. Then the hook was able to pass through the hole with a needle inserting another thread, thus forming the desired pattern. Intricate patterns were achieved by having many cards arranged one after the other and/or used repeatedly.

This idea of punch cards was revolutionary because it used the idea of a machine having the ability to follow an algorithm. These punch cards were innovative because the cards had the capability to store information on them. This ability to store information was what helped spark the computer revolution. Jacquard's punch card system proved to be such a useful idea that it was incorporated into the ideas of many computer scientists that followed.

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About Joseph Marie Jacquard (1752-1834) - Jacquard Loom:

In 1804, French silk weaver Joseph Marie Jacquard invented the Jacquard Loom that weaved complex designs. Jacquard invented a way of automatically controlling the warp and weft threads on a silk loom by recording patterns of holes in a string of cards.

The Jacquard cards were later modified and evolved into computing punch cards by Charles Babbage and later Herman Hollerith.

According to Wikipedia*: Joseph Marie Jacquard was born at Lyon, France on the 7th of July 1752. On the death of his father, who was a working weaver, be inherited two looms, with which Joseph Marie Jacquard started business on his own account. Joseph Marie Jacquard did not, however, prosper, and was at last forced to become a limeburner at Bresse, while his wife supported herself at Lyon by plaiting straw.

In 1793, Joseph Marie Jacquard took part in the unsuccessful defense of Lyon against the troops of the Convention; but afterwards served in their ranks on the Rhóne and Loire. After seeing some active service, in which his young son was shot down at his side, Joseph Marie Jacquard again returned to Lyon.

There Joseph Marie Jacquard was employed in a factory, and use his spare time in constructing his improved loom, of which he had conceived the idea several years previously. In 1801, he exhibited his invention at the industrial exhibition at Paris; and in 1803 he was summoned to Paris to work for the Conservatoire des Arts et Métiers. A loom by Jacques de Vaucanson (1709—1782), deposited there, suggested various improvements in his own, which he gradually perfected to its final state.

Joseph Marie Jacquard's invention was fiercely opposed by the silk-weavers, who feared that its introduction, owing to the saving of labor, would deprive them of their livelihood. However, its advantages secured its general adoption, and by 1812 there were 11,000 looms in use in France. The loom was declared public property in 1806, and Jacquard was rewarded with a pension and a royalty on each machine.

Joseph Marie Jacquard died at Oullins (Rhóne) on the 7th of August 1834, and six years later a statue was erected to him at Lyon.

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