Industry and Inventions

The Lowell Mills Francis Cabot Lowell builds a factory in Waltham, Mass -Spun cotton into yarn & wove it into cloth Figured out how to work power looms from seeing them in England - stole the technology like Samuel Slater) Factory was so successful he built a factory town called Lowell

Lowell mills employed farm girls –Lived in company-owned boarding-houses –Worked 12 ½ hour days Young women came in spite of the noise because of high wages –Between $2 - $4 a week –Some men making that in factories Older women supervised the girls –Enforced strict rules The rise in steam powered factories forced the mills to close (and others like them who used water power) The Lowell Mills

Factories did many tasks in one place –Increase efficiency Eli Whitney –Interchangeable parts Made each part of a manufactured item exactly alike Reduced prices of goods New Way to Manufacture

Transportation Revolution Robert Fulton –creates boat powered by steam to transport people quicker Fulton used it to commercially to transport people up the Hudson River from New York City to upstate New York Roads built to connect cities

Samuel Morse – creates the telegraph –sends short pulses of electricity along a wire that could be translated into letters The telegraph took seconds to communicate to someone in another city Communication Revolution

John Deere –Invents a lightweight plow with a steel cutting edge –Designed for rich and heavy Midwestern soil Cyrus McCormick –Invents a mechanical reaper to cut ripe grain –Threshing machine separated kernels of wheat from the husks New farm equipment opened new markets to grow food