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Joseph Marie Jacquard Biography

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JACQUARD, Joseph Marie (1752-1834). A French inventor, born at Lyons. He was the son of a weaver and at first followed his father's trade, but afterward was a bookbinder and typesetter. Still later, after the death of his father, he began experimenting with looms and lost his small inheritance (1772). In 1793 he fought in the Army of the Rhine, on the Rhone and Loire, and then went back to Lyons, where he completed his invention, known as the Jacquard loom, for which he was awarded a bronze medal at the Industrial Exposition of 1801. He continued to improve his loom despite the hostility of the Lyons silk weavers, who feared that his labor-saving device would throw them out of employment. In 1806 his invention was bought by the state and declared public property. Jacquard was rewarded with a pension and a royalty on each loom, and in 1840 a statue of him was erected at Lyons. See Loom, for an account of his invention.