Sewing machine mechanic in demand
When your Singer breaks down, who ya gonna call? Bill Murray, of course
COBBLE HILL — Bill Murray started fixing sewing machines as a teenager in Victoria more than 50 years ago — “for beer and cigarettes,” he said at the workshop in his Cobble Hill basement.
Murray is not the famous actor/comedian from Caddyshack, Ghostbusters and Saturday Night Live, though he is quite funny. He is a legend of sorts among the community of sewing shops, local designers, quilters and hobby sewists across the Island.
“In my circle, everybody knows him,” said Ellen Box, designer and owner of Bonspiel on Lower Johnson Street. A few weeks ago, the industrial sewing machine Box uses to sew leather bags broke down.
“If anything goes wrong with that machine, my world falls apart,” said Box, who called Murray. “He came out the same day in his van. He’s very punctual.”
Box said she met Murray more than a decade ago on his regular visits to the Smoking Lily studio, where she worked, to fix machines and sharpen scissors. Once, he even took a part from his wife’s sewing machine to fix hers in an emergency, she said.
“Everybody knows him by word of mouth. But the name really does make a difference,” Box said.
Murray grew up in Victoria. His dad was a navy man and the family lived in Belmont Park in Colwood. Murray baby-sat for neighbourhood families. One of the moms worked as a secretary at Sawyer’s Sewing Centre and suggested he get a job there. So Murray started fixing sewing machines for 70 cents an hour at age 15.
He went to Victoria High School and took an interest in carpentry and mechanics.
“In the summers, I went commercial [salmon] fishing,” said Murray, who also worked as a truck driver. Fixing sewing machines has always been a constant. He continued to work for Sawyer’s until 1994 and then set out on his own.
“I have three part-time jobs,” said Murray, who also drives a bin truck for his son’s business and unloads trucks at the Hillside Centre Sears.
The sewing-machine business takes him up and down the Island from Sidney to Campbell River. In Victoria, he picks up sewing machines that need fixing at the three different shops, including the Makehouse on Fort Street, and drops them off when he’s done. He buys and sells used machines as well, treating requests as treasure hunts for particular models.
He doesn’t advertise or have a website, but he does have Facebook page. You definitely won’t find him giving tutorials on YouTube. “I’m a bit old school. It’s all by word of mouth and a phone call,” Murray said. “If you have an industrial machine or are elderly, I’ll come to you.”
Murray’s basement shop is packed with dozens of sewing machines, with everything from 1930s foot-treadle Pfaffs to a hightech electronic embroidery machines. Storage shelves are lined with boxes of tiny parts and he has a library of machine manuals from decades of models.
“There’s no one particular brand I see more of. The older, the better the machine usually,” said Murray. His favourite is a 1970s to ’80s Kenmore. “They are just tanks.” Murray’s advice for anyone wanting to buy a machine is to not spend more than $300 to $500.
“You don’t need a thousand built-in things,” he said. Anything with a basic straight-stick and zig-zag will do.
While Murray’s wife has a sewing room at home and makes clothing for the Bamboletta doll company, he rarely sews.
“I used to sew patches to the fronts of pants when I was fishing, but that’s about it,” he said.
Murray said he doesn’t see retiring from the sewing-machine business any time soon. “I like mechanical things and I like the people,” he said.