Lecutre #17 -- Industry & Society

I. Introduction

            A. LAst time, we looked at the beginnings of the industrial revolution in Great BRitain, and the beginnings of change in the cotton textile industry.

            B. Today we are going to further explore the changes of the industrial revolution, and and look at the changes wrought in society as a whole, the latter of which will be the focus of our discussion today.

II. Textiles & the Factory

            A. When we left off last time, we had seen several inventions that had sped up production in the cotton textile industry. From the flying shuttle to the spinning jenny, to Arkwright's water frame and Crompton's mule in 1779, which combined the last two into one machine.

                        1. With these innovations also came on another that was essential -- from the mind of Richard Arkwright, and that was the idea of factories. These started out to cobat industrial espionage and kept the new processes and machine secret, but eventually the factory system caught on for reasons beyond secrecy. Why leave all of these jobs in separate places? The work was more mechanized now, and instead of travelling from place to place, the goods could be produced in one location -- one FActory. Labor was brought to a central location. The people came to the manfucaturing site. These factories were built near water for easy transportation of the goods and for power for the new inventions.

            B. The factory system was not the last of the innovations, for the cottage system was still prospering because the machines still ran by hand, but this would soon change.

                        1. In 1787, Edmund Cartwright invented the first power loom, powered by water which allowed weaving to catch up with the spinning. It was fairly inefficient, however, and the cottage industry persisted until the 1820s. Another boon to British textiles soon arrived, however, from America from a fellow named ELi Whitney, the inventor of the Cotton Gin. The Cotton Gin made the cotton grown in the American south a profitable commodity. Before it had too many seeds, and took to long to card. This boosted British production, but also revitalized the insitution of slavery in the AMerican South, which had been on its way out economically.

                        2. When Richard Roberts invented an Efficient Power Loom than ran on one the most important elements of the industrial revolution -- steam power. The number of power looms went from 2,400 in 1813 to 250,000 in 1850. By 1830, 28,000 adult women and 20,000 adult men were operating nearly 50,000 power looms throughout Great Britain.

                        3. James Henry Hammond said it best "Cotton is King!", and indeed she was the king of manufactured goods, and of American exports. In 1750, Britain imported less than 5 million pounds of cotton; by 1850 it was 588 million pounds. Cotton madeup over 40% of British exports, and by 1850 over half a million earned their living from cotton -- in Britain alone.

                        4. Not everyone was happy though, the mechanization put many out of work. In fact, the power loom helped make hand loom weaver the first large scale groups of technologically unemployed workers. Organised opposition developed with the foundin of the Luddites in the 1810s. This group wanted to maintain independent labor and part of this process were organised attacks on the machines to smash them. Industrial violence. 

            C. The changes that the Luddites were opposed to were happening everywhere. The textile industry was only the beginning. Many of the changes that began in textile spread to other industries, particularly the factory system. The spread of the inudtrial revolution was made even more attractive by the work of a Scottish Engineer named James Watt (1736-1819) who developed one the most important inventions of the industrial revolution -- a new type of engine powered by steam.

                        1. Watt was asked to repair a Newcomen engine, which had been developed in 1712 by Thomas Newcomen. It was powered by a steam pump, and was usually called an atmospheric engine. It was extremely inefficient, though was better than using horses. Instead of repairing though, Watt refined the steam engine. He added a separate condenser and a steam pump which mad the first true and efficient steam engine. In 1782, he added a rotary engine that could drive a shaft, and thus machinery.

                        2. This efficient steam engine transformed society. It meant more power for textile production, which made the factory system even more efficient and encouraged its spread. It sped up production and increased output. It would also occasion further changes.

            D. In order for the steam engine to be practical in a factory setting, new developments were necessary in the iron industry. TO use machinery powered by steam, the machines themselves had to be built to withstand more heat and pressure -- they had to be made of metal, not wood, and that meant iron.

                        1. The process of smelting iron into a usable metal had not changed much since the middle ages. A better process was invented in 1709, and then in 1780s, a process using coke, a coal-derivative was invented to produce a high-quality iron, which caused a boom in the British iron industry, and produced several fortunes. The process itself soon spread to the Continent as well.

                        2. Wrought-iron became the metal of choice until 1856, when Herny Bessemer perfected a method for removing the impurities in iron to make steel, and in the 1860s an open hearth process was developed that made it faster and more profitable.

            E. The goods were being produced at a high rate, but by the late 18th century, the manufacturers, and industrialists had one major complaint -- the couldn't get raw materials fast enough, or their goods to the consumers. This would give rise to the great revolution in transportation.

                        1. Earlier in the 18th century, Britain had begun already to improve her transportation system to help trade and exports. Better roads were constructed, and more importantly canals were dug all over Britain to sped goods to market. Yet,despite this, men and material still only moved as fast as the currents, or the fastest horse. The stagecoach was considered a vast improvement.

                        2. With the steam engine, however, the stagecoach soon became obsolete. It made possible a new form of travel -- railroads. The first practical locomotive was the invention of George Stephenson (1781-1848), known as "The Rocket". He reverrsed the usual cart and track procedures in the mines, makeing the wheel grooved and the track smooth. In 1829, Stephenson won a prize with his locomotive, which pulled a load three times its own weight at a speed of 30 mph, actually outrunning a horse. Amazing spectators. A demonstration was put on, and William Huskinson, a member of parliament was amazed at how fast it moved. So amazed, that he got onto the tracks to see better, and not understanding how fast it was moving, was run over and killed.

                        3. A year later, the first modern railroad was built from Manchester to Liverpool. 1835 -- 750 miles; 1845 -- 2,000 miles; By 1852, just 22 years later, over 7,500 miles of railroads were in use in Britain. Soon the greatest task these rails were performing was not the movement of goods, but of people.

            F. Life in Great Britain had changed dramatically with the Industrial Revolution, and iron, steel, and Rails would solidify the process. By 1850, Britain was workshop, banker, and trader of the world. So, it was time to show off.

                        1. In 1851, Britain organized the world's first industrial fair to demonstrate all the inventions and goods that her workshop produced. It was known as the Great Exhibition. It took place at Kensington in London at the Crystal Palace.

                        2. The hall itself was a demonstration of the industrial revolution and the splendour of Britain's wealth. It was the brainchild of the Duke of Devonshire's gardener. They wanted to build in a great open space, but what about the trees? So they built the structure entirely of glass and iron. The building began in July 1850 and was finished in April 1851. I million square feet of glass, with a ventilation system, and covered 19 acres, and was built around the trees, sparrowhawks were used to drive out the birds.

III. The Middle Class

            A. The class that revelled in this splendour was the dominant class, but that did not mean the aristocracy. The Industrial ervolution created two classes -- the first was the working class, which I will discuss in a moment, and the second was the middle class. The class that made the most money was probably the aristocracy, but those who set the values & standard were the middle class. The middle class, or the bourgeoisie as the French eventually named them were those who improved in the Industrial REvolution. These people did well out of industry, and they did not live in the slums of the new cities. They lived in comfortable homes, and worked as Factory owners, office workers, and in the professions -- law, medicine, government.

            B. It was from this class that a new set of values sprang as well -- ones different from the upper class emphasis on position, money and presitge, and the working class' emphasis on equality and survival.

                        1. The Middle class values of the Industrial revolution would form the core for what eventually became known as Victorian values, for it was during the reign of Queen VIctoria in England that they took firm hold.

                        2. The first of these was Work. They strongly believed that work was the solution to anything, and if you worked hard you would achieve your goals and be happy. There were all kinds of self help books printed -- Samuel Smiles in 1859, Self-Help was an instant best seller.

                        3. The second important value was Home. The home was the sanctuary fo r the man who fought in the outside world. And along with that was Family. The Middle class firmly segregated the domains of men and women. The man went out and fought all day in atough world. But at the end of the day he came home to the "Angel of the House" -- the woman who was too frail and delicate, and stayed in the home. "Cult of Domesticity"

                        4. The third value was Thrift. The home and family survived by work and by thrifty saving. Credit was NOT acceptable; you saved your money and then bought. The ultimate status symbol became the piano in the parlor -- that you paid cash for, regardless of whether anyone actually played it.

                        5. The final value was a Moral Code. The victorian moral code of the middle class was much stronger than that of the working class or the aristocracy. It was based on evangelical Christian morality. The sexaul mores were strict, partly in re-action to the flagrant violations of marriage vows by the upper class.

            C. Along with the virtues, the middle class also had the sins, which it deemed more heinous than any others. The first of these is what you might expect given a strong moral code -- Sexual Immorality.

                        1. Having a strict sexual code did not mean that the Victorians were prudes. It simply meant that to be caught was to be ostracized. Unfortunately, the most likely to be caught were females, and as a result a double standard operated, leaving men free to consort with prostitutes, but the prostitutes themselves were persecuted and prosecuted. Contagious Diseases Act, whereby the police could stop any suspicious looking woman and force her to submit to a physical examination.

                        2. The worst sin was not however sexual immorality, but Bankruptcy. Thrift was the highest virtue, and as result an inability to pay one's debts was a sign of failure and moral deficiency. The Quakers would actually disown any member who declared bankruptcy. -- It was a form of dishonesty and meant one was out of the comfortable class.

            D. These were the standards that came out of the prosperity of the industrial revolution. The middle class, though smaller, actually set the standards for what was respectable. If these were the standards, though, let's take a look at the realities of the industrial revolution for the working class.

IV. Changes in Society

            A. The splendor and wealth and innovation demonstrated by the Crystal Palace was only one side of the Industrial Revolution, however. The building of factories meant the congregation of a work force into one place. That, of course, meant that accommodations for this workforce also had to be there, in the forms of the growth of old and new towns.

                        1. Although wouldn't become a really urban society until the 20th century, city population shot up dramatically in the first half of the 19th century. For instance, the size of London more than doubled from 1800 to 1850. Also by 1850, more than 20% of British citizens lived in cities. Urban industrial centers sprang up where a field had been for centuries. Manchester had been a relatively small town in 1700, but by 1801 there were 75,000 people there, and 50 years later, the population had more than quadrupled.

             B. Before the industrial revolution, England had basically one class-- the aristocracy. You were either part of it, or you weren't. With the growth of industrialization, the structure of society began to change.

                        1. The first class that grew out of industrialization was of course the Working Class or what Karl Marx called the Proletariat. These were the children and grandchildren of peasants who had migrated to the factories to find higher wages and employment. After a generation, this meant that European cities housed a vast proletariat which was generally uneducated and entirely dependent on wage earning for a living.

                        2. Providing adequate housing for the rapidly increasing number workers and their familes was a daunting task. Which meant that inevitably, there was over-crowding. Often times, families would move to the city with virtually no money, just looking for work. Houses were usually built in back to back configuration, with two rooms upstairs, and two rooms downstairs. This system was first used in Leeds and while it provided for an efficient use space, there was no cross ventilation.

                        3. Other places built "model" dwellings of flat blocks which were 5 or 6 stories tall. In Birmingham, single-family model houses were built in rows 12 ft square area w one privy in the yard shared by 6 families. Others simply lived wherever they could find room. This was in some respects no worse than in the country, but the concentration was higher.

                        4. I mentioned 6 families to one outhouse, right? Actually, that was a good ratio. Outhouses, known as "privies" were located at the end of a row of houses. This is where people either used the outhouse or dumped waste. In one Manchester district, 33 outhouses had to accommodate 7,095 people. Talk about lines for the bathroom. The natural outgrowth of this, of course, is disease, and pollution of air, water, but no one took notice of this except for the smell and the smoke occasionally.

            C. Such close living conditions did have one major outcome, beyond the obvious problems, it meant that these people became conscious of themselves as a class with common interests and shared ideals and sufferings. They would eventually band together to improve their conditions and to create their own sub-culture of songs and values.