Textile Factories Come to the U.S.
American conditions:
- different resources: wood is plentiful, resources like
ores
are very spread out
- labor: most people wanted to farm, might work a few years
to
earn money
- people are very spread apart, distances are very large
- shortage of skilled workers
- people who came to the U.S. were more ambitious, open to
new
things
- capital was scarce and tended to be invested in
plantations
or overseas trade
The industrial revolution was slow to get started in
the U.S. because the U.S. was a third world country and England was
determined to protect its advantage
- England passed a law in 1765 (repealed
1824-25)
prohibiting export of textile machinery and emmigration of skilled
mechanics.
- E.
I. duPont said in 1802: "The greatest danger
to my business is that of attracting the attention of the English...
They
employ all possible means to prevent the establishment of manufactures
here. They burned my predecessor's cotton mill, and might easily
try to do the same
to my mills."
-
Thomas
Jefferson: fear of the misery of industrial
cities in England and belief that an agricultural nation was essential
for
democracy. Felt that farmers were by nature virtuous. He
wasn't
against technology--he had a lot of machines on his plantation, but he
was
against industrialization until the blockades starting in 1807 that
lead
to the war of 1812 convinced him that the U.S. couldn't afford to be
dependent
on other countries for manufactured goods.
- Early efforts to smuggle in machines weren't
very
successful, eg. disassembled mule that arrived in Philadelphia in 1783
was
never successfully assembled. The first useful drawings of
textile
equipment were not available until 1812, published description of how
to
run machinery not until 1832
- shortage of labor, shortage of capital,
shortage
of skills
Slater Mill
First successful mill--Slater Mill
- Samuel
Slater had served a 7 year mill
apprenticeship in England. Came to the United States to make his
fortune and made a
partnership with a hardware merchant--Moses Brown--in
Pawtucket, RI
- Slater put up his expertise and his partners
put
up the money, and Slater got half ownership
- set up in an old fulling mill in 1790, then
build
a new mill in 1793. 100 spindles, spinning only, Arkwright
water frames, little innovation. Metal parts made by local
blacksmiths, relying on
Slater's knowledge of critical dimensions, gearing, settings, surfaces.
- At first used almost entirely child labor--hired
7 boys and 2 girls between the ages of 7 and 12 in 1790. By 1800
he
had more than 100 employees, and he relied on recruiting families and
providing housing for them around the mill (fathers often worked as
hand loom weavers, not in the mill).
- Slater owned or had an interest in 13
textile mills,
and left an estate of $690,000 when he died in 1835.
- By 1810 there were 54 mills in
Massachusetts, 26
in Rhode Island, 14 in Connecticut--all small mills without integration
- British immigrants made up about half the
managers
and machine-makers before 1830.
map from National Atlas of
the
United States
Origins of Lowell :
- Boston merchants became interested in
textile factories after the War of 1812 showed the advantages of
diversification. Boston Manufacturing Co.: Nathan
Appleton, Patrick Tracy Jackson, Francis
Cabot Lowell
- hired an English mechanic named Paul
Moody to build
a power loom and set up a factory on the Charles river in
Waltham. Opened
in 1815--first complete cotton factory in the US. Capitalized at
$400,000
(10x Slater).
The steps in making textiles
- Needed more water power in order to expand,
and
wanted to build a new town to avoid the corrupt city.
- Lowell, Mass, at the beginning of the
Middlesex
canal. First mill opened in 1822--built by more than 500 Irish
laborers
who were subject to such discrimination that they were not allowed to
work
in the mill. They lived in a shanty town called The Acre
Boots
Mill, Lowell
The Lowell labor system:
- land was cheap in the United States and
people wanted to own their own farms, not work in mills. Where to find
a workforce for a
large mill?
- hire young
women from the countriside to work
for
a few years before they get married. Women lived in heavily
supervised dormitories,
were required to attend church, followed many factory
rules, and made good wages for women
at
the time.
- The women averaged $3.60 a week in 1836, at
which
point they were paying $1.50 a week for room and board. This
compared
favorably to $1 a week for domestic work.
- until the mid 1840s the work was not
stressful,
although they worked 73
hours hours a week (a 12 to 14 hour
day, six days a week, 309 days a year, with only
three holidays).
Timetable from a
page about Lowell workers . Intermittent labor,
mostly fetching and carrying.
weaving
(image
#10)
Lowell changes:
- Lowell population
- 1820--200
- 1830--6,000
- 1850--33,000
- The Boston Manufacturing company returned an
average
annual dividend of 19% from 1816 to 1826. Even in the more
competative
1850s the Merrimack Company (which operated some of the Lowell mills)
averaged 12% annual return for most of the decade.
- Competition began to result in a worse deal
for
the workers as early as the 1830s--in 1836 there was a strike in
reaction
to a cut in wages of $1 a week. Speed-up made the work damaging
to
health
- immigrant workers began to be hired in the
1840s:
immigrant workers in mills: 1845--8%, 1850--33%, 1860--60% (of those
47%
were Irish--potato famine started in 1845).
more Lowell history
this page written and copyright
Pamela E. Mack
last updated 9/28/05
