Isaac Singer

Both men are credited with inventing the sewing machine allowing people to have more than just two outfits which at the time were work clothes or their Sunday worship clothes.

While Isaac Singer built the first commercially successful machine (a brand still in existence today,) it used the lockstitch that had been previously patented by Elias Howe in his version of the sewing machine. Howe sued Singer for patent infringement and won forcing Singer to pay Howe patent royalties.