The Industrial Revolution

During certain periods in history, innovations in technology have grown at such a rapid pace that they have produced what have become known as industrial revolutions.

The term INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION originally referred to the developments that transformed Great Britain, between 1750 and 1830, from a largely rural population making a living almost entirely from agriculture to a town-centered society engaged increasingly in factory manufacture.

Other European nations underwent the same process soon thereafter, followed by others during the 19th century, and still others (such as Russia and Japan) in the the first half of the 20th century. In some countries this transformation is only now taking place or still lies in the future.

The Indutrial Revolution started in England, because that nation had the technological means, government encouragement, and a large and varied trade network. The first factories appeared in 1740, concentrating on textile production.

In 1740 the majority of English people wore woolen garments, but within the next 100 years the scratchy, often soggy and fungus-filled woolens were replaced by cotton especially after the invention of the cotton gin by Eli Whitney, an American, in 1793.

Such English inventions as the flying shuttle and carding machines of John Kay, the water frame of Richard Arkwright, the spinning jenny of James Hargreaves, and the improvements in weaving made by Samuel Crompton were all integrated with a new source of power, the steam engine, developed in England by Thomas Newcomen, James Watt, Richard Trevithick, and in the U.S. by Oliver Evans.

Within a 35 year period, from the 1790s to the 1830s, more than 100,000 power looms with 9,330,000 spindles were put into service in England and Scotland.