Chapter Summary

3 Things I learned:

- Britain's restrictions on the export of skill laborers and plans were not as strict as they had hoped them to be.

- Without James Watt's improvements to the design of the steam engine, much of the Industrial Revolution would not have come to pass.

- If Moses Brown had not sponsored Samuel Slater, the modern factory system would have been delayed in coming to the United States.

2 Things I found interesting:

- Samuel Slater's ability to memorize factory machinery plans and reproduce them was remarkable.


- The Erie Canal allowed for the easy export of grain from the United States' Mid-West to Britain after the repeal of the Corn Laws.

1 Question I still have:

- How did the steam locomotive make its way to America? Was it the product of earlier British designs of the brain child of a pioneering American inventor?

Spotlight On:The Steam Locomotive

With the invention and improvement of the steam engine in the late 17th and early 18th Centuries, it was only a matter of time before it was put to work in transportation. This was first done by Richard Trevithick in 1804, who constructed the first working steam locomotive for use in the mining and iron-working industry. As time went on the design of the steam locomotive progressed and developed, most notably with the invention of the Rocket steam locomotive by George Stephenson in 1829. This more efficient model reached a top speed of nearly thirty miles per hour and was used exclusively on the Manchester Railroad for the transport of people and goods between Liverpool and Manchester, England. With these innovations, England's railway system began to rapidly expand, allowing for the easy and effective transportation of people, goods, and raw materials across the ever growing industrial nation.

US Events: Construction of the Erie Canal

Inspired by the explosion of successful canal building in Britain in the late 18th Century, the state of New York desired to develop a canal system of its own for the transport and distribution of goods, people and raw materials around the state. The solution to this came with the construction of the Erie Canal, which began in 1817 and was completed in 1825. This canal, which is still in existence today, runs 363 miles from Albany, New York to Buffalo, New York, connecting the Hudson River to Lake Erie. Because this canal connected the eastern seaboard of the United States to the mid-west via the Great Lakes, it allowed for the easier distribution of manufactured goods from the east to the west, as well as the export of agricultural products such as grain, particularly following the repeal of Britain's Corn Laws. The canal also provided an easy mode of transportation for the large number of European immigrants as they traveled to the newly expanding mid-west in search of work.

US Events: Samuel Slater and Moses Brown

Samuel Slater

Moses Brown

Growing up in industrial Britain and working in textile factories from the age of ten, Samuel Slater used this experience to bring cutting edge textile machinery to the United States. During this period strict legal action was taken to prevent the export of machinery plans and experienced laborers from Britain to secure dominance in the Industrial Revolution. Taking this into account Slater memorized plans for cotton mill machinery and left Britain for the United States in 1789. 

It was in 1789 that Slater met pioneering American Industrialist Moses Brown who had just begun the operation of a spinning mill in Pawtucket, Rhode Island. After struggling with inefficient and ineffective machinery, Brown struck a deal with Slater to construct and implement the machinery which he had memorized. By 1793 Slater had constructed several water frames and other textile machinery, allowing the factory to be opened with he and Brown as co-operators.

People in the News: John Cockerill

The son of William Cockerill, John Cockerill helped aid in the spread of industrialization into mainland Europe building on the work of his father. Initially the Cockerill family moved to French-occupied Belgium where William Cockerill began the manufacture of cotton spinning equipment, that at the time was a closely guarded English trade secret. Following and expanding upon his father's legacy, John bought a Belgian palace in 1817 with the intention of converting it into the family's business headquarters. On this site he and his brothers augmented the equipment manufacturing plant with its own iron foundry and machine factory, something that was unheard of outside of Britain in that time.

People in the News: James Watt

Known for pioneering the invention of the steam engine, James Watt, a Scottish inventor and engineer, did much to advance the Industrial Revolution with his improvements made to the Newcomen steam engine. During his early work with steam engines Watt noticed them to be rather inefficient due to the energy wasted in the cooling and re-heating of the engines' steam cylinder. This prompted him to develop a separate condenser unit for the cylinder, allowing much more energy and water to be conserved, creating a more powerful and efficient steam engine on the whole. With this advancement steam engines also became much more cost-effective, allowing them to be used in a larger number of factories, which in turn allowed the factories to be more productive, a key factor in the booming economy of the Industrial Revolution.

People in the News: Adam Smith

A Scottish philosopher and one of the founding fathers of political economics, Adam Smith is widely regarded as the father of modern capitalism. In his work Wealth of Nations, first published in 1776, Smith lays the foundations of what would develop into the capitalism that is practiced worldwide today. A key concept introduced by Smith was the free market system, also known as "Laissez-faire", in which businesses operate independent of the government and are instead run by private parties which fosters competition between companies for market dominance. It is this mindset that would spur on the fledgling companies of the early Industrial Revolution to grow and expand into large corporations as they sought to turn the largest profit.

Introduction and Essential Question

This blog, Chapter 22: The Industrial Revolution will cover chapter 22 of the A History of Western Society Eighth Edition textbook.

This chapter covers a period from roughly 1750 to 1850 during which the roots of the industrial revolution took hold in Great Britain with the implementation of the factory system and spread throughout Europe and the rest of the world in the coming decades ushering in a new era of mass-produced, inexpensive products that is still in effect today.

In this blog I hope to shed light on people involved in world affairs during the time of the Industrial Revolution and highlight events that were occurring simultaneously in the United States during this period.

The Essential Question

Who were the ambitious new leaders that spearheaded the Industrial Revolution and how did they contribute to its growth and expansion across Europe?