Aim: Why was the Industrial Revolution considered a Turning Point in History? DO NOW: What is a “Turning Point”?
Jul 19, 2015
Aim: Why was the
Industrial Revolution
considered a Turning
Point in History?
DO NOW: What is a “Turning Point”?
Why should we care?
http://youtu.be/5oTCA9V3eNs
http://youtu.be/QgYbUmBxpPUUP to $22.00per
pound
$3 to $7 per
pound
How goods were made
before the Industrial
Revolution
The Putting Out System - “Cottage Industry”
Domestic System1600s-early 1700s, cloth was made by the domestic system.Most of the work was done in the cottages of the workers.Whole families worked together.
Merchants delivered raw wool and cotton to the cottages. The workers used hand-powered spinning wheels and looms. They would spin the thread and weave wool and cotton cloth. This was all done at home mainly by Mothers and their daughters. The merchant would then pick up the finished cloth to sell. The domestic system could not keep up with the demand for cloth. This forced the creation of large factories to supply the huge demand for manufactured (factory-made) cloth.
Every great town has one or more slum areas into which the working classes are packed. Sometimes, of course,
poverty is to be found hidden away in alleys close to the stately homes of the wealthy. Generally, however, the
workers are segregated in separate districts where they struggle through life as best they can out of sight of the
more fortunate classes of society. The slums of the English towns have much in common—the worst houses in a
town being found in the worst districts. They are generally unplanned wildernesses of one- or two-storied terrace
houses built of brick. Wherever possible these have cellars which are also used as dwellings. These little houses
of three or four rooms and a kitchen are called cottages, and throughout England, except for some parts of
London, are where the working classes normally live. The streets themselves are usually unpaved and full of
holes. They are filthy and strewn with animal and vegetable refuse. Since they have neither gutters nor drains the
refuse accumulates in
stagnant, stinking puddles. Ventilation in the slums is inadequate owing to the hopelessly unplanned nature of
these areas. A great many people live huddled together in a very small area, and so it is easy to imagine the
nature of the air in these workers’ quarters. However, in fine weather the streets are used for the drying of
washing and clothes lines are stretched across the streets from house to house and wet garments are hung out
on them. . . .
Source: Friedrich Engels, The Condition of the Working Class in England, W. O. Henderson and W. H. Chaloner, eds., Stanford University Press
The Rate of Industrial Growth in Five
Selected Countries
Industrial Production
Percentage of World
Industrial Production in 1913
(Five European Countries)
UK
France Germany Russia Italy
1781-90 3.8 10.9 - - -
1801-14 7.1 12.3 - - -
1825-34 18.8 21.5 - - -
1845-54 27.5 33.7 11.7 - -
1865-74 49.2 49.8 24.2 13.5 42.9
1885-94 70.5 68.2 45.3 38.7 54.6
1905-13 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0
% of world
industrial
production in
1913
14.0 6.4 17.7 5.52.7
The Factories"You know the scene: the great oblong ugly factory, in five or six tiers (levels), all windows, alive with lights on a dark winter's morning, and again with the same lights in the evening; and all day within, the thump and scream of the machinery, and the thick smell of hot oil and cotton fluff and outside the sad smoke-laden sky, and rows of dingy streets and tall chimneys belching dirt, and the same, same outlook for miles."~ Edward Carpenter, Towards Democracy, p.452
“...due to the large number of skilled and unskilled people who
were looking for work during the period of rapid urbanization
were actually facing the problem of low pay which barely above
the subsistence level, long working hours, housing shortage, poor
sanitary conditions, poverty, overcrowding and poor medical
environment has plagued the poor.”
The Victorian era became notorious for the employment of
young children in factories and mines. Child labor has played an
important role during the industrial revolution. Due to the poor
schooling opportunities, most of the poor children as young as 5
or 6 years old were put to work and generally died before the age
of 25. Orphans were often subjected to this slave-like labor.
Children would often work in dangerous jobs for low wages, such
as working in the factory with large, heavy machines, and with
long working hours. They worked up to 19 hours a day, with only
one hour as total break. The owner of the factory justified their
payroll by providing orphans food, shelter and clothing.
What kinds of lives to you think these children
had? Describe/ Explain.
Iron, Coal, and SteelTo build machine parts, iron was needed.To power steam engines, coal was needed.In the 1700s, ironmaking became expensive. Charcoal was used to smelt iron.
Charcoal is made by burning wood. England was running out of forests. 1753, a process of smelting iron with coal was found.Iron became cheaper to make. Iron production increased.Coal mining became a major industry.
Why was the steam engine a valuable technological
development during the Industrial Revolution?
The Steam Engine
Another one of the great inventions that came about
during the Industrial Revolution was the steam engine.
Both coal and iron were crucial during the Industrial
Revolution. Coal was used to power the steam engines
and to make iron. Iron was used to improve machines and
tools, and to also build bridges and ships. At the
time, most manufacturers used charcoal to smelt iron.
Abraham Darby developed "coke" to do this instead,
which was said to be not as strong as the charcoal that
they had been using.
Thomas Savery built a steam pump in 1698. A few
years later, Thomas Newcomen built a steam engine.
When Watt and Boulton began selling engines in 1776,
steam had been around for seventy years and almost
Six hundred engines had been built.
Watt's first engines delivered about six horsepower,
little more than early Newcomen engines did. But
Watt's engines were smaller and he'd soon quadrupled
energy efficiency. By 1800 some Watt engines could
deliver as much power as your automobile engine.
An industrial revolution is a fundamental economic change:
● between 1770 and 1850 the economy of England changed from mostly
agricultural to mostly industrial
● this was the result not of one key invention but of technological progress in
different fields coming together
● its center is the development of factories (which hadn't really existed before
this time), but they couldn't have developed without better transportation
creating larger markets and better transportation couldn't have existed
without the growth of the iron industry, which couldn't have grown without
steam engines
● society had a hard time adjusting to the new economic system