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biography
| sex:
| male
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| lived:
| (1811–82)
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| biography:
| Lawyer and entrepreneur, born in Athens, New York, USA. He began practising law in Poughkeepsie (1833), and moved his practice to New York City (1836) to form Jordan and Clark with his father-in-law, the state's attorney general. In 1854 sewing machine inventor Isaac Merritt Singer came to the firm for advice in his defence against a patent infringement suit brought by Elias Howe. Clark became a partner in the I M Singer Co and organized the first American patent pool, the Singer Machine Combination, which licensed 24 companies before expiring in 1877. He also established the principle of installment buying which the Singer Co pioneered, thus making it possible for modest homemakers to purchase the expensive sewing machines. He took over as president of the company in 1875 when Singer died. By 1882 the company had manufacturing plants in Glasgow (Scotland), Montreal (Canada), and Elisabethtown, NJ. |
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