Industrial Revolution

The Industrial 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 (see Factory System). 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.

One of the most important innovations in the weaving process was introduced in France in 1801 by Joseph Jacquard; his loom used cards with holes punched in them to determine the placement of threads in the warp. This use of punched cards inspired the British mathematician Charles Babbage to attempt to design a calculating machine based on the same principle. Although this machine never became fully practical, it presaged the great computer revolution of the 20th century.