Industrialization and Technology Early 1800s
• A shift from goods made by hand to factory and mass production
• Technological innovations brought production from farmhouse to factories– Invented in Britain in 1750; smuggled to U.S.– Beginning of US Factory System
• US slow to embrace factory system– Scarce labor– Little capital– Superiority of British factories
Workers & Wage Slaves
• With industrial revolution, large impersonal factories surrounded by slums full of “wage slaves” developed
• Long hours, low wages, unsanitary conditions, lack of heat, etc.– Labor unions illegal
• 1820: 1/2 of industrial workers were children under 10
Workers & Wage Slaves• 1820s & 1830s: right to vote for laborers
– Loyalty to Democratic party led to improved conditions
– Fought for 10-hour day, higher wages, better conditions
• 1830s & 1840s: Dozens of strikes for higher wages or 10-hour day– 1837 depression hurt union membership
• Commonwealth v. Hunt – Supreme Court ruled unions not illegal
conspiracies as long as they were peaceful
• Population shift because of westward expansion – the West demanded transportation.– The Land Act of 1820, gave the West its wish by authorizing a buyer to purchase
80 acres of land at a minimum of $1.25 an acre in cash
• Erie Canal started in 1817 and completed in 1825– NY Governor DeWitt Clinton built the Erie Canal– Connected New York City from Hudson River with the Great Lakes and the West
• Clinton’s Big Ditch--------Other canals follow
• Navigable rivers and the steamboat– the first steamboat on western waters was in 1811.
Erie Canal System
• Built first textile mill in 1793 in Pawtucket, Rhode Island.
• Born in England on June 9, 1768 and worked in British factories. • Slater came to US to make his fortune in the textile industry.
• Slatersville Mill was the largest and most modern industrial cotton mill
of its day
Samuel Slater was the "Father of the American Factory
System."
The Lowell System Lowell, Massachusetts,
1832
• Young New England farm girls• Supervised on and off the job• Worked 6 days a week, 13 hours a day• Escorted to church on Sunday
Produced the first cloth in the US
Early Textile Loom
• 1830s, Industrialization
grew throughout the North…
• Southern cotton shipped to Northern
textile mills was a good working relationship.
Resourcefulness & Experimentation
Americans were willing to try
anything. They were first copiers, then innovators.1800 41 patents were approved.1860 4,357 “ “ “
• Eli Whitney’s cotton gin revolutionized the cotton industry.
• He is also noted for the concept of mass production and interchangeable parts by
creating dyes for pistols and rifles. • Very important early pioneer in America’s
industrial revolution.
Cotton Production
The invention which changed
the South, cotton and slavery.
Whitney Ends the Fiber Famine• Cotton gin invented in 1793
– 50 times more effective than hand picking• Raising cotton more profitable
– South needs slavery more than ever for “King Cotton”
New England factories flourish with Southern cotton
John Deere & the Steel Plow
Cyrus McCormick& the Mechanical Reaper
1807, Fulton's Clermont, was the first commercially successful and reliable
steamboat. Steam boat would revolutionize water travel.
The steamboat was often the only mechanical means of river travel and freight transportation
from 1808 through 1930.
Samuel F. B. Morse
1840 – Telegraph“WHAT GOD HATH WROUGHT”
Pioneer Railroad Promoters• 1800 to 1850: Roads, canals, navigable rivers with
steamboats were the main modes of transportation.
• 1850 to 1860, RR proved most significant development toward national economy
• Led to development of Time Zones• Competition between Railroads and Canals• Obstacles
– opposition from canal backers– danger of fire– poor brakes– difference in track gauge meant changing trains – to
combat this problem standard gauge was introduced meaning
all track was the same size
Cyrus Field & the Transatlantic Cable, 1858
Highways• Bad roads made transportation highly
unreliable
• The National Road begun in 1811 and completed by 1832– Connected Maryland to Illinois.– Built by US government
Cumberland (National Road), 1811
• Help unite the country as well as improve the economy and
the infant industry.
•Because of the British
blockade during the War of 1812, it was essential for
internal transportation improvements.
From left to right: Eli Whitney (cotton gin, interchangeable parts), Robert Fulton (steam boat), Thomas Edison (light bulb), Cyrus McCormick (reaper), Richard Hoe (automatic printing press)