12.1 Industries Take Root pp. 386-391

Objectives: Describe the industrial development of the United States. Explain why American cities grew rapidly.

A. The Industrial Revolution (pp. 386-387) The rise of factories that used machines to produce goods is called the Industrial Revolution. Beginning in Britain in the mid-1700s, it changed where and how people lived, how they earned a living, and what kinds of goods they could buy. The factory system—using machines and workers together—made it possible to produce large quantities of goods.

B. Revolutionary Inventions (p. 387) Before the Industrial Revolution, textiles (fabric, cloth) had been made in homes or in small cottages using a spinning wheel. In the second half of the 1700s, new inventions--like James Hargreaves’ Spinning Jenny and Richard Arkwright’s Water Frame--shifted the focus of textile manufacturing from the home to the factory.

C. Industry in the United States (pp. 387-388) The Industrial Revolution did not get started in the United States until the early 1800s. In 1789 a British textile worker, Samuel Slater, defied British law and came to America with memorized plans of British textile machinery. He offered his secrets to Moses Brown, and together they established a successful cotton mill in Pawtucket, Rhode Island, the first factory in the United States.

D. Industrial New England (pp. 388-389) Due to the region’s swift-running rivers and its thin, rocky soil, the Northeast soon became the industrial center of the United States. In 1813 a young Bostonian, Francis Cabot Lowell, took a major step in industrialization. Lowell put the entire process of converting cotton into cloth in one building.

E. New Methods of Working (p. 389) An inventor named Eli Whitney came up with the system of interchangeable parts, or parts that are exactly alike. Interchangeable parts led to the division of labor—dividing up the work and giving each worker one or two simple jobs to do. Interchangeable parts, division of labor, and other new manufacturing methods made mass production of goods possible.

F. Working Conditions (pp. 390-391) Women and children made up a large percentage of workers in factories because they could be paid less than men. Factory workers put in long hours—12 to 14 hours a day, 6 days a week—often in unsafe and unhealthy working conditions. People began moving from farms to cities in search of factory jobs, which often resulted in overcrowded slums. To improve things, workers often organized into labor unions, which demanded higher wages and better working conditions.

Review: What was the Industrial Revolution? Who was Samuel Slater and what impact did he have on industrialization in America? Besides inventing the cotton gin, how else did Eli Whitney affect industrialization in America? Describe working conditions in the early factories? How did the Industrial Revolution affect where many Americans lived?