The American Industrial
Revolution
1793-1850
The Birth of the Factory in America:
• Samuel Slater brought British machinery
secrets to U.S.A.
• Opened the 1st factory in Pawtuckett, RI.
-focused on production of cotton thread
-Lowell, MA 1st mill to manufacture all aspects of
the textile.
-”Mill Girls”= women factory workers
Infrastructure and government:
• Turnpikes= toll roads; money used to improve
the roads being travelled on.
• National Road-Western Maryland to the Ohio
River. (in present day West Virginia)
Water travel:
• Steamboat is invented by Robert Fulton
• Drastically sped up water travel:
before steamboat: New Orleans to
Louisville took 4 months.
after steamboat: same trip in 20 days.
Water travel continued…
• Cross Atlantic travel:
before steamboat: 25-50 days
after steamboat: 10-14 days
Canals:
• Began in the Northeast
• Erie Canal System, 363 mi. across NY state.
before canals: cost to ship 1 ton of
freight=100$
after canals: 4$
“King Cotton”
• Replaced tobacco as the dominant southern
crop.
• Eli Whitney, cotton gin, 1793.
• Cotton production in 1793: 5 million lbs.
1820: 170 million lbs.
*Southern Plantations created 60% of all cotton
used in U.S. and European manufacturing.*
Innovations:
• Interchangeable parts
Eli Whitney developed the idea and process
of manufacturing goods more uniformly.
-created easy fixes to problematic or
old tools.
-shifted jobs from skilled artisans to
specialized “assembly line” like work.
Innovations continued…
• Telegraph
-Samuel Morse, 1833
-provided nearly instant communication.
-hugely important for transportation and
news.
A Revival of Slavery:
• Slave trade abolished in 1808.
• 1.5 million slaves by 1820.
• Cotton production neccesitated an increase in
slave labor.
• Slavery advocates argued that slave conditions
were better than mill/factory conditions in
England.
Economic Developments of the early
1800’s:
Increased Reliance on Domestic
Economy:
Decreased Reliance on International
Commerce:
National Road
Embargo Act, 1807
Erie Canal
End of Slave Trade, 1808
Growth of factories/mills
New inventions/innovations
The Increasing importance of
cotton?