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William Lee born around 1563 in the village of Calverton, was not only an English inventor who devised the first stocking frame knitting machine in 1589, the only one in use for centuries, but was also an English clergyman.
He entered Christ's College, Cambridge in 1579 and graduated from St. John's College in 1582.
Lee was a curate at Calverton when he is said to have developed the machine because a woman whom he was courting showed more interest in knitting than in him (or alternatively that his wife was a very slow knitter). His first machine produced a coarse wool, for stockings. Eventually, he moved to France with his brother James, taking 9 workmen and 9 frames. He found better support from the Hugenot Henry IV of France, who granted him a patent. Lee began stocking manufacture in Rouen, France, and prospered until, shortly before Henry's assassination in 1610, he signed a contract with Pierre de Caux to provide knitting machines for the manufacture of silk and wool stockings.
But the climate changed abruptly on the king's death and despite moving to Paris, his claims were ignored and he died in distress in 1614.
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