His father was engaged in that
business; and Joshua entered his office at fifteen. He remained
there for two years, employing his spare time in mechanical
drawing. He afterwards spent two years in his uncle's banking-
house in Paris, prosecuting the study of mathematics in the
evenings. Some of his relatives having established a small cotton-
spinning factory at Mulhouse, young Heilmann was placed with
Messrs. Tissot and Rey, at Paris, to learn the practice of that
firm. At the same time he became a student at the Conservatoire
des Arts et Metiers, where he attended the lectures, and studied
the machines in the museum. He also took practical lessons in
turning from a toymaker. After some time, thus diligently
occupied, he returned to Alsace, to superintend the construction of
the machinery for the new factory at Vieux-Thann, which was shortly
finished and set to work. The operations of the manufactory were,
however, seriously affected by a commercial crisis which occurred,
and it passed into other hands, on which Heilmann returned to his
family at Mulhouse.
He had in the mean time been occupying much of his leisure with
inventions, more particularly in connection with the weaving of
cotton and the preparation of the staple for spinning.
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