The Elias Howe Company was a nineteenth and early twentieth century musical firm located in Boston

Boston

Boston is the capital of and largest city in Massachusetts, and is one of the oldest cities in the United States. The largest city in New England, Boston is regarded as the unofficial "Capital of New England" for its economic and cultural impact on the entire New England region. The city proper had...

, USA

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 and founded by Elias Howe, Jr. (1820-1895). The founder was not the eponymous and better-known inventor

Elias Howe

Elias Howe, Jr. was an American inventor and sewing machine pioneer.-Early life & family:Howe was born on July 9, 1819 to Dr. Elias Howe, Sr. and Polly Howe in Spencer, Massachusetts. Howe spent his childhood and early adult years in Massachusetts where he apprenticed in a textile factory in...

 of the sewing machine

Sewing machine

A sewing machine is a textile machine used to stitch fabric, cards and other material together with thread. Sewing machines were invented during the first Industrial Revolution to decrease the amount of manual sewing work performed in clothing companies...

 but a contemporary and possibly a distant relative.
According to Patrick Sky

Patrick Sky

Patrick Sky is a musician, singer and songwriter of Irish and Native American ancestry...

, Howe acquired a fiddle

Fiddle

The term fiddle may refer to any bowed string musical instrument, most often the violin. It is also a colloquial term for the instrument used by players in all genres, including classical music...

 as a young boy and soon learned to play. Part of his musical education involved listening to other New England

New England

New England is a region in the northeastern corner of the United States consisting of the six states of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut...

 fiddlers and copying down the tunes they played.