The Industrial Revolution was the
changeover to new industrial processes
from somewhere in 1760 to
sometime between 1820 and 1840.
This evolution comprised of
moving from manufacturing goods
with hands to machineries,
bettered efficacy of water power,
manufacturing of new chemicals and
producing iron through new ways, usage of
steam power, the advancement of machine
tools and the upsurge of the factories.
In terms of employment fabrics were the
leading trade of the Industrial Revolution.
Keeping in mind the value of
production and the principal invested;
the fabric industry was the first to
use contemporary manufacturing ways.
The foundation of the Industrial
Revolution was laid in the United Kingdom
and some of the most significant
technical inventions were from Britain.
The revolution took pace in 1815 and
continued till the next century.
The steam power was a
breakthrough in this revolution;
the idea was mainly to pump out water from
the English iron and coal mines, this
artificial power rapidly converted to
driving force for the coming century.
In years to come this invention
was used in textile production,
mining, iron smelting and
many other industrial quests.
The beginning of 19th century
witnessed yet another
invention after the steam
engine: railroads.
The steam engines also directed the
way to invention of first steamboats
and then steamships that made
regular journeys across the ocean,
radically decreasing the time
taken to travel overseas.
There are many factors
that can be taken into
consideration which lead
to Industrial Revolution
however there are three
main factors to which this
industrial age could be entrenched
to: steam, iron and coal.
Coal was used to fire the steam engines and
was produced in huge quantities in England.
These mechanical devices and other machines
were designed and forged out of iron.
The vagaries that started in the Industrial
Revolution never actually came to an end.
The roots of this revolution dated
back to thousand years ago.
History speaks of Iron
Age which began in 1000
B.C. when man carved
weapons and tools of iron,
the Iron Age sustains as we
are still dependant on this
essential metal and the effects
of Industrial Revolution
persist to amend modern economies creating
undulations in the industrialized world.
The Industrial Revolution symbols
a key turn-off in history;
nearly every facet of day-to-day
life was swayed in some way.
In specific, average
revenue and populace began
to display extraordinary
constant progress.
Many economists say that
the main effect of the
Industrial Revolution was
that the standard of living
for the overall people arose steadily for the
first time in history, though others say
that it did not begin to evocatively progress
till the late 19th and 20th centuries.
At about the same time the Industrial
Revolution was happening, Britain was
experiencing an agricultural revolution, which
aided to expand the standard of living.
In early 19th century, production of
textile in a mechanised way spread from
Great Britain to Europe, France being
the home to most important centres.
An important iron manufacturing
centre established in Belgium,
industrialisation spread fast throughout
the world since its inception.
The exact start and end date of the
Industrial Revolution is still argued
by the historians, as is the stride
of social and economic change.
GDP per capita was approximately
steady prior to the Industrial
Revolution and the advent of
the modern capitalist economy,
whereas the capitalist economies
witnessed an age of per capita economic
growth in the capitalist economies
in the age of Industrial Revolution.
Beginning of Industrial Revolution has
been labelled as the most significant
occurrence in the history of mankind since
the domestication of plants and animals.
Between the shifting years
1840 and 1870, when technology
and economy progressed rapidly
embracing steam transport
and mass production of machine tools and the
usage of machines in factories that were
powered by steam, the first
Industrial Revolution
evolved to Second
Industrial Revolution.
Where it All Started
There are many countries
who have been active
participants in the
Industrial Revolution
however it all started with
Great Britain which then slowly
moved to America, Europe and
the rest of the Continent.
Great Britain Heads the Way
Earlier the English had become one the
most powerful nations of the world.
Early in 18th century overseas trade
made Britain a wealthy country.
During the many wars that happened in the
century particularly the Seven Years
War, Britain extended their control
over many colonies across the seas.
England’s main rival France
lost control of Canada
and India to the English
in the mid-century.
The English navy commanded powerful
trading ships spread across the world.
The English faced a lot of
problems on various fronts;
population of British
Isles multiplied quickly
which led to shortage
of wood and cloth.
People replaced wood for coal
and used it in place of wood
to cook, heat the homes for
smelting and blacksmithing.
Huge demands for coal lead to extensive
mining, miners dug deep to supply
the people with coal and to find coal
in the surface was no more possible.
Deep mines posed a problem
because water seeped in them and
something needed to be done to
pump out the water from the mines.
The solution was soon invented –
steam powered pumps, these machines
forced water out of the flooded coal
mines making it mineable again.
Earlier the English used wood to smelt
iron which they soon replaced with coal.
First they used charcoal to heat iron
and to remove its carbon impurities but
later on in the 18th century these
smelting industries started using coke –
which was a greyish, hard substance produced
when soft coal was heated in an air
tight oven which removed the coke gas and
coal tar as the fuel for smelting iron.
This expanded the business
of coal mining in England.
Since Middle Ages, England was home to wool
trade, the English men raised sheep in
their farms and spun thread which was later
spun into woollen clothes and garments.
The growing population now required
clothes and to overcome this
shortage many new machines took over
the old system of cloth production.
When the English expanded their
trade to Egypt and India,
they were introduced to a new
type of material: cotton.
There were thousands of women who worked
to spin wool and now cotton but since
the requirement was too much they
lagged behind in the mass production.
The old ways of using the spinning wheel
could not keep up with the demand.
There were two things required more
quantity and better quality for
which two things were required
good machines and to build faster.
These set ups required bigger space and
bigger facilities, which led to the
establishment of factories which was also
the result of Industrial Revolution.
Revolution in Metal Industry
Once coal replaced wood and other
types of natural fuels there
came about a drastic revolution
in the metal industries.
When given a certain amount of
heat coal needed less labour
in mining than chopping wood and
then turning it to charcoal.
Coal was naturally obtainable in plentiful.
Coal gained its importance in 1678,
when Sir Clement Clerke and a few other
inventors started using it in
reverberatory furnaces called cupolas.
These cupolas were operated
by controlling flames on the
charcoal, coke mixture and ore
which reduced the oxide to metal.
The advantage of using this
mechanism was that the
impurities like sulphur ash did
not combine with the metal.
The same technology was
later applied to smelt
lead and copper in 1678
and 1687 respectively.
Later in 1709 Abraham Darby
successfully fuelled
his blast furnaces at
Coalbrookdale with coke.
The coke iron that was
manufactured by him was used
to make cast-iron products
like kettles and pots.
He had patented his cast and hence had an
advantage over his rivals because the pots
Darby manufactured were thinner and cheaper
compared to his competitors products.
Darby’s sons established
two furnaces at Ketley and
Horsehay who produced bar
iron in the mid 1750’s.
Coke pig iron was now cheaper
than charcoal pig iron and
since iron cast was also cheap
and was available in plenty
it was started to be used
as materials to build
new structures like the
Iron Bridge of 1778.
Till now the ironsmiths still
used the finery forges
to make daily consumer
products from the bar iron,
but with time new procedures were developed
and implemented in the years to come.
The earlier methods were known
as potting and stamping
which were later modified by
Henry Cort’s pudding process.
Cort made two important
iron producing processes:
in 1783 he developed the rolling process
and in 1784 he made the puddling process.
In order to consolidate wrought
iron and remove scum hammering was
replaced by rolling which was about
15 times faster than hammering.
Initially the rolling mills were
used to make sheets but later on the
process was used to roll structural
shapes like rails and angles.
When pig iron was decarburized
using slow oxidation,
and iron ore was used
as a source of oxygen
as it was stirred manually
with the help of a
long rod, the process
was known as puddling.
Decarburized iron has higher melting point
compared to cast iron so it was scraped
into blobs by the puddler and once the blob
was big enough the puddler removed it.
It was not easy to pudlle in such high
temperatures in the reverberatory
furnace and there were only some
puddlers who made it to the age of 40.
Puddlling was used till
the 19th century when
steel was slowly taking
the place of iron.
The process of puddling could
never be mechanised as it
needed the skills of a human
to sense the iron blobs.
Till mid 17th century
the British iron
manufacturers used substantial
quantities of iron
that was imported to add-on
the local provisions
which mostly came from
Sweden and Russia.
Later from the 1785 they
stopped importing iron from
the countries thanks to their
iron making technology
and began exporting
wrought iron products to
customer and bar iron
to other countries.
The most vital development of
the 19th century was the hot
blast which was made and patented
by James Beaumont Neilson,
the process saved energy in the
process of making pig iron.
The combustion air was preheated
by using waste exhaust heat
so the quantity of fuel required
to make one unit of pig iron
was decreased by around one-thirds if
coal was using and two-thirds if coke
was used, the effectiveness was more
every time the technology was bettered.
Hot blast kept the
temperatures of the furnaces
high and helped in
growing their capacity.
The lesser the coke or
coal was used the fewer
impurities was present
in the pig iron,
this also meant that anthracite or lower
quality of coal could be used in places
where coking could not be done or the
process was too expensive to be performed.
Nevertheless by the end of the 19th century
the transportation costs fell extensively.
About twenty years before
the Industrial Revolution
laid its foundations, the
production of steel;
an expensive commodity then, was improved
and used to make products like springs
and cutting edge tools as iron couldn’t
be used to make such commodities.
In 1740’s Benjamin Huntsman developed
a crucible steel technique which
use blister steel as raw material
made by the cementation process.
Inexpensive steel and iron
helped many industries
like nails, wire, hinges
and hardware products.
Improvement in the machine tools made
it easy to work with iron because
of which the metal was used in making
of machines and engine industries.
Revolution in the Textiles
For years England was
the spearhead in the
making and extension of
Industrial Revolution.
There are some noteworthy reasons to why
there was a sudden shift of England;
from being dependent on agriculture to
relying increasingly on industrialization.
For example, in the 1700’s Britain was
led by parliamentarians and ministers
who reacted compassionately to commerce,
trade and industrial expansion.
Their lands were rich with
raw materials such as
coal and iron ore and
human labour was cheap.
There were many financial
institutions like banks
and lending houses which
helped in raising capital
to purchase steam engines, make factories,
construct mills and employ workers.
Moreover England had many overseas markets
they had to be ready with products
which could be used for trading like coal,
iron, textiles or any other things.
One of the causes of Industrial Revolution
was originated in the textile industry.
When cotton material was introduced
to England in 1600’s it completely
changed the way of producing cotton
thread and cotton materials.
There were a series of improvements and
creations that brought about the change.
An English weaver John Kay from Lancashire
invented the flying shuttle in 1733,
in which a handloom could be operated
by a single person instead of two.
However the mass was not quite
happy with the invention as they
thought the new machine could
leave many people unemployed.
The angry crowd attacked Kay’s
home and demolished it.
Kay’s flying shuttle took time to
gain recognition, which however
helped to improve the production
speed of a single weaver
but the one-man loom
needed thread from four
to five spinners to keep
a loom worker busy.
Within years in 1765, a carpenter
from Lancashire, James Hargreaves,
invented a spinning machine
which could spin eight threads
at a time he named the machine
“Jenny”, after his wife”.
He patented his new invention in 1770.
Slowly the number of
threads which a spinning
machine could produce
increased to 100 however;
the cloth workers reception of
such new inventions was slow as a
matter of fact Hargreaves too faced
the same consequences as Kay
when his house was attacked and his newly
invented spinning jenny was burned.
Cotton thread industry was transformed
by these wonderful devices.
The spinners were now spinning around
20000 spinning jenny’s by 1778.
This machine cut down
the working hours which
were spent in spinning
thread and yarn.
Earlier one had to work for
1000 hours to make about
22 pounds of cotton thread
whereas the spinning jenny
brought down the spinning
hours to 400 and with further
improvements and creations it
came down to just 20 hours.
Lancashire seemed to be
home to many inventors.
In 1769, Richard Arkwright a barber from
the same place held patent to water-frame.
These rollers were powered
by water which were used
with spindles to produce
coarse but strong thread.
Some years later Samuel
Crompton a tinkerer also from
Lancashire produced fine
and strong cotton thread
by combining Hargreaves
spinning jenny and
Arkwright’s water-frame and
called it Spinning Mule.
These machines brought
about a revolution in the
textile industry to an
extent that the English
who were spinning about 8 million
pounds of thread in 1770
started spinning 37 million
pounds of cotton by 1790.
The quantity kept
increasing and in 1815 the
English reached the 100
million pound mark
and by 1850 the English
weavers boasted of
spinning around 250
million pounds of cotton.
Edmund Cartwright was aware
that once Arkwrights
patent expired the demand
for spun cotton would go up
and leading to a shortage
of weavers he invented
a power loom in 1784 which
he patented in 1785.
Edmund Cartwright had built two factories
both of which were destroyed by
his workers and burned down by his
workers and angry mob respectively.
Cartwright’s machine design had many faults,
especially thread breaks and in 1813
Samuel Horrocks patented
a better loom which
proved to be fairly good
and was successful too.
Richard Roberts bettered his
loom in 1822 and Roberts, Hill & Co.
manufactured these looms were
manufactured in huge numbers.
The increasing demand for cotton was
a good prospect for the planters
of Southern United States if they
could remove the seed with ease.
Keeping this in mind Eli Whitney
invented the economical cotton gin.
What a woman could do in two
months cotton gin did in a day.
More inventors effectively
improved the steps
required in spinning
increasing the supply of yarn.
These inventions and innovations
were supplements for the
weaving industry which helped
them to grow and flourish.
The final product or the outcome
of a labourer increased intensely.
Although Richard Arkwright is
accredited with many creations
they were truly developed by
John Kay and Thomas Highs;
Arkwright was an entrepreneur who fostered
these inventors, patented the concepts,
funded the creativities and
sheltered these machines.
He established a cotton
mill that brought together
all the processes of
production under one roof
and it was he who developed the
use of horse power and then water
power simultaneously, which
mechanised the industry of cotton.
Back in 19th century Manchester
was known as Cottonopolis
because of many textile
industries in the city.
Revolution in Steam Power
What drove the Industrialization
age was primarily
exploiting a natural
source of power – steam.
The innovative minds of
the ancient ages also
understood the marvellous
power of steam.
In A.D 60 a Greek tinkerer, Hero of
Alexandria made a small machine that was
made up of metal spheres with sprouting
jets and was mounted on centre shaft.
When the water present in
the sphere was heated using
fire, the ball moved when steam
spurted out if the jets.
It cannot be called a perfect device
as it did not serve any cause, it
was more like a toy and the rudimentary
device was named aeolipile.
Many years later the
device was built again
but this time, it was
for a specific purpose.
Increased demands of coal
required the English to
dig deeper into mines which
drove water in them,
in order to get rid of this problem these
devices were used to pump out the water.
Deeper the mines more
acute the problem became.
Earlier when the water problems
were closer to the earth’s surface
were solved by using horse gins –
gin was short word for engine.
The method involved horses
who walked in circles
with a huge drum tied to
a pulley and a bucket.
Since the mines were now deep
the horse gins could not solve
this problematic situation, a
new technology was required.
Thomas Savery, a British citizen
came to the rescue for this problem;
in 1698 he invented a low power steam
engine which functioned as a pump.
The water pump – that was branded by the
name Miners Friend, produced around one
horsepower and was put to work for many
water related works and coal mines.
For minor horsepower ranges related works
Savery’s pump was very cost-effective
but was susceptible to explosion of its
boiler for large horsepower ranges.
These pumps sustained in the
market till late in the 18th
century till an English metal and
iron salesman Thomas Newcomen
built his piston steam
engine in 1712 in the
Midlands near Dudley
Castle near Coalbrookdale.
The engines were productively used in the
deep mines which were blocked by water,
since these engines were kept on
surface they were huge in sizes,
needed a lot of investment to be
built and produced 5 horsepower.
If we look at the machine
from our perspective
it was incompetent as per
our modern standards
but if they were set
on pit heads where the
coal was cheap it gave
way deep coal mining.
Despite a few disadvantages
the engines of
Newcomen were easy to
maintain and dependable too,
hence they continued to give their services
to the coal mines till early 19th century.
By the time Newcomen died his
work spread far and wide
beginning with Hungary ,
Austria, Sweden and Germany.
According to the records an aggregate
of 110 engines were been built
by 1733 after the joint patent
expired 14 of which were in abroad.
Within years an engineer John Smeaton
built many large and improved
engines and the total number of engines
built reached to 1,454 by 1800.
James Watt from Scotland
brought about an
essential variation in the
operating principles.
Englishman Matthew Boulton had
almost perfected his steam
engine by 1778 which assimilated
many essential enhancements,
of it the most noticeable thing
was that the upper part of the
cylinder was sealed off enabling
the low pressure steam engine
to drive the top of the piston in
place of the atmosphere, there was
a separate chamber for condenser
and the usage of a steam jacket.
The cooling water which was inserted
right into the cylinder in order to cool
it and was used to waste steam, was
removed because of a separate condenser.
The inclusion of a steam jacket
retained the steam from condensing
in the cylinder which also improved
the competence of the engine.
The bettered ways and
processes that had now been
integrated in the steam
engine by Watts and Boulton
used just 20 to 25
percent as much coal per
horsepower per hour as
compared to Newcomen’s engine.
Watts and Boulton
manufactured such engines in
the Soho Foundry which
was established in 1795.
By 1800, Watts steam engine could straight
away drive the rotary machinery of a mill
or a factory, it had been completely
transformed in a double acting rotative type.
Watts engines were profitable and popular.
Their company Boulton
& Watts had made 496
engines - 24 serving blast
furnaces, 164 driving pumps
and 308 powering mill
machinery, almost
all the engines produced
5 to 10 horsepower.
Many metal machinery tools
played an important
role in making these
powerful engines.
Engine planning, milling, lathe and
shaping machines were power-driven
by these engines which enable the
accurate cutting of the metal parts.
The design of the steam engine
until the 1800 was based on beam
engine, made as an essential part
of a brick or stone engine house
but soon many different
outlines of a self-sufficient
rotative engine was produced
like the table engine.
In the beginning of the 19th
century, Richard Trevithick,
a Cornish engineer along with
an American, Oliver Evans,
built non-condensing high pressure steam
engines, fatiguing against the atmosphere.
The engines were solid
enough and could work on
rail locomotives, mobile
road and steam boats.
Revolution in Machine Tools
The many machines that
were being developed
increasingly required
machinery to cut metal parts.
Some small tools were
developed earlier by the
watch and other small
instrument repairers.
Before machine tools were invented
there were many hand tools
that were in use like files,
scrapers, hammers, chisels and saws.
Metal was hardly used
and the wood products
would split or crack
with changes in weather.
With the revolution metal frames and parts
became popular and had soaring high
prices because of the hard labour behind
it to achieve the meticulousness.
Many craftsmen gave their inputs by
crafting wind mills and wooden frames etc.
The first big machine tool build was the
cylinder boring machine which could be
used to bore the large-diameter cylinders
on the earlier built steam engines.
The planning, shaping and
milling machines followed.
In the early parts of 19th century
Joseph Bramah an inventor and
locksmith, had patented a lathe similar
to that of a slide rest lathe,
hired Henry Maudslay to
produce high security metal
locks which required
meticulous workmanship.
Maudslay was a perfectionist
in the slide rest
lathe which could
perfectly cut screws with
various pitches of thread using variable gears
between the lead screw and the spindle.
Later on Maudslay set up his own shop
and trained many men on this machine.
Revolution in Chemicals
John Roebuck has been credited with
the production of first chemical
sulphuric acid, which he did by using
the lead chamber process in 1746.
He replaced the expensive glass
containers with compartments made
of lead and produced large quantities
around 100 pounds at a time.
Production of alkali and
sodium carbonate followed
which was produced by
Nicholas Leblanc in 1791.
He also introduced the Leblanc process
in which sodium chloride was reacted
with sulphuric acid to produce
hydrochloric acid and sodium sulphate.
Sodium carbonate had
many uses in industries
like soap, paper,
textile and glass.
Earlier sulphuric acid was used to remove
rust from iron and to bleach clothes.
Based on the discoveries of Claude
Louis, in 1800 Charles Tennant
made an improvement in the
production of bleaching powder,
earlier the process had required
months which he now reduced to days.
His factory at North Glasgow had become the
biggest chemical factory in the world.
Later in the 1860’s Germans took
the lead in producing dye and had
many ambitious chemists rushed to
German to learn the procedure.
British did not set up
any universities as an
alternative just employed
German chemists.
Revolution in Other Trades
Cement - A British, Joseph Aspdin,
patented portland cement in 1824.
The portland cement was
used to construct the
London sewerage system
and the Thames tunnel.
Gas Lighting - William Murdoch was the
person who brought in this revolution and
in London between 1812 and 1820 the first
gas lighting utilities were set up.
Gas lighting played a crucial role in
the industrial organisations as because
of light the factories and other set up
could remain open for a longer time.
Paper Machine - Nicholas Louis
Robert invented a machine which made
continuous sheet of paper and the
machine was named Fourdrinier.
This method of paper production
is still used by today
although there have been many
alternations made to it.
Glass Making - In the year 1832,
Lucas and William Chance (Chance
Brothers) first used the cylinder
process to make glass sheets.
The continuous sheets of glass helped
in planning many interiors freely.
Agriculture - The main machines
that helped in the revolution of
agriculture were the Dutch plough,
threshing machine and seed drill.
In 1701 a better seed
drill was invented by
Jethro Tull but it was
an expensive machine.
The first marketable plough was made
by Joseph Foljambe Rotherham in
1730 and the threshing machine was
made by Andrew Meikle in 1784.
The threshing machine bought about riots and
revolts as manual threshing required a lot
of labour, many labourers lost jobs and caused
the agricultural rebellion Swing Riots.
Transportation – The turnpike road
network, railway lines, waterways and
canal were all improved because of the
Industrial revolution in Britain.
It was now easy to move
products, commodities and raw
materials speedily, easily
and at a cheaper price.
Better transportation helped new
ideas to spread across fast.
Canals – The first canal Bridgewater
Canal in North West England was built in
the 18th century and most of the fund
came from the 3rd Duke of Bridgewater.
Many canals followed soon and
Thames and Severn Canal and Leeds
and Liverpool canal were the most
noticeable ones on the list.
Later on Manchester Ship
Canal was the largest canal
in the world and was
inaugurated in the year 1894.
Roads & Railways – Before the revolution
could start roads were not properly kept
and later on after the 1720 turnpike
trusts were set up to maintain the roads.
John McAdam, Thomas Telford and
John Metcalf were responsible to
engineer the roads and they did not
disappoint their fellow countrymen.
The first steam run public railways began
in 1825 with Stockton and Darlington
Railway and in 1830 Liverpool and Manchester
Railways were opened for the public.
Railways took pace in 1829
when hot blast was developed
which lessened the fuel
intake of making iron.
Social Effects
Industrial Revolution was a roller coaster
in the lives of those who witnessed it.
Although the changes were for good in
long term there are many who suffered the
wrath of modern machinery and inventions
of various machines and products.
The cottage industry was practically
applicable in every home,
where a farmer and his family
mostly produced goods themselves.
The spinning jenny’s were
fairly priced and could
be afforded but the
products which replaced
it were very expensive and the only thing a
man could do was get a job in the factory.
The factory labourers were poorly paid.
It was not until the late
1980’s that the standard
of living for the
common masses improved.
Most of the population
constituted of the poorer class
who endured much declines in
their standards of living.
The wages were increased only
by 15% in the late 1780’s.
Earlier many died of hunger and
malnutrition in France and
Britain and on an average people
lived only for about 35 years,
this was because of the increasing
population with the Industrial
Revolution things became cheaper and
food prices were decreased too.
People during these times
lived in extremes;
factory owners had beautiful houses whereas
the labourers of the factories did
not even have a proper enclosed home
which lacked sanitation facilities also.
People shared small rooms and
slept on sawdust, unhygienic
situations gave rise to many diseases
and there were many diseases
that were caused by water like typhoid and
cholera were common among the children.
Conditions improved only in
19th century when many health
regulations were followed
and conditions improved.
Industrialization Beyond United Kingdom
Belgium
Just after the Industrial Revolution
in Britain, Continental Europe also
lined up with their inventions and
creations to bring about a revolution.
Most of their ideas were borrowed
from Britain and a part of
Ruhr Valley in Westphalia got
the name of “Miniature England”
because their inventions were
same as that of the English.
In many situations only some parts of
the British inventions were adopted
as their locally available resources
were different than the English.
There were many mining areas build in Liege
and Charleroi and John Cockerill set
up a factory in Seraing which had all the
processes from production to supply.
Historians have also stated
about many developments on iron
making as well especially in
Sambre, Haine and Meuse Valleys.
The revolution was considered
to be quite traditional
and didn’t quite affect
most of the population
except for those areas which were situated
near the coal mining and iron making areas.
Unite States of America
While other countries were
experiencing Industrialization
America continued to be
an agricultural economy.
Railways, roads, waterways and canals
were important to move the agricultural
products and the natural especially in
such a huge but thinly populated country.
America saw Industrial
Revolution with the invention of
cotton gin and a method of
making interchangeable parts.
The invention of machine tools and
the way of making interchangeable
parts lay foundations for
the industrial revolution.
Oliver Evans made an automatic four
mill which required absolutely
no labour from the time of loading
the grain to the flour discharge.
Later in 1787, Cabot Brothers and
Thomas Somers found the Beverly
Cotton Manufactory which was the
biggest cotton mills of the time.
The American Industrial Revolution was
set on the banks of the Blackstone
River and its tributaries and around
1100 mills functioned in this valley.
In 1854 Waltham Watch Company
situated in Waltham in Massachusetts
was recognised to bring industrialization
in the watch industry.
Samuel Slater set up the Slater
Mill in 1793, he mastered his
skills from Derbyshire in England
and moved to New York in 1789,
by breaking the British laws of the
emigration of skilled workers, where
he later owned 13 textile mills
after he founded the Slater Mill.
Germany
The Germans were wonderful chemists and
they flourished in their chemistry.
People flocked from all
over to study in their
universities and learn
the new ways of dye.
Earlier because of lack of
unity among them the Germans
lagged behind in building
efficient roads and railways
but Britain’s quick development
buckled them up and
they were soon constructing
railways and roads.
Sweden
Sweden experienced two
revolutions simultaneously
agriculture revolution and
industrial revolution.
They had large estates, new
farming tools and crops
and developed a system of
proto-industrialization
where the farmers could grow their crops
and when they were free after the
harvest in the winters they could
move to the industries to earn wages.
The industrial revolution focused on
their local markets which circled
on paper making, textiles, mechanical
engineering and power utilities.
The country prospered with trade
and commerce when they opened
the gates for free trade and
exported wood, steel and crops.
Japan
The leaders from the Meiji
period helped in bringing
about an Industrial
Revolution in Japan in 1870.
They sent thousands of
youngsters to Europe and United
States to learn their ways and
employed over 3,000 experts
from western world to learn their language,
technology, mathematics and modern science.
The Iwakura Mission of Japan
was a break-through in their
revolution and Japan quickly
caught up with the others.
In 1882, Bank of Japan was
founded and used taxes
to set up textile factories
and model steel.
Japan's first modern
industries came up in textiles
which comprised of cotton
and the famous silk.
Silk was made in many workshops which
were at home mostly in the rural areas.
The History has experienced
much turmoil and
Industrial Revolution has
contributed much to it.
This phase saw the most intelligent
of people who set base
to modern machines, tools
and techniques that we use.
Historians have varied
opinions about the Industrial
Revolution which cannot
be summed up easily.
Capitalism was caused as when science
was on its boom and developments
which brought about an upgrade
in the society as a whole.
The machines helped the
people to work with ease
and provided jobs to
everyone in the factories
which led to increase in
wealth and only the adults
worked while the children
and adults were free.
Socialism came up as an
evaluation of capitalism.
According to Karl Marx Industrial
Revolution divided the society into two;
bourgeoisie were who possessed
the means of production,
the land and the factories and
the other was proletariat,
the labourers who performed the work in
the factories under the bourgeoisie.
He saw the industrialisation
procedure as the rational
dialectical development
of feudal economic modes,
essential for the complete growth of
capitalism, which he saw as in itself a
required predecessor to the growth of
socialism and ultimately communism.
The debate can be endless
however it can be concluded by
saying that Industrial
Revolution was a significant era
and mankind is still evolving
with those basic principles
of inventions which took
place during that period.
