Industrial Revolution

The Industrial Revolution which also began in Britain during the 18^th century and it was spread too much in the Northern Hemisphere throughout the 19^th and early part of the 20^th centuries.

Also the advent of mechanized mass production heralded the transformation of Europe and its countries and also the North America. England was the place filled with series of events which changed the world.

THE BEGINNINGS OF THE INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION

The reason why Industrial Revolution started in Britain is because it had the advantage to be a united country which is also stable in internal political situations, free from internal customs duties and with well-established banking and insurance facilities.

In the 18^th century Britain become as a dominant international trading power. Many merchants had accumulated large sums of capital. England was the first country to pass from an agricultural to industrial economy and this period is consequently known as the Industrial Revolution.

The mainspring of the change was the discovery of a new source of power—steam.  At first this was used in mining and then it was taken to textiles factories, and finally it was applied to transport when the Railway Age opened in 1832.

As I am doing this, I thought to myself how can I imagine England in the middle  of the eighteenth century. I would imagine a picture, a landscape without railways and very few roads or canals. There were no coals mines in South Wales and Yorkshire. There were no big factories or mills or blast furnaces. Infect the chief fuel used at this time was still wood and charcoal. This was some expensive to employ in such industries as existed.

Thanks to the genius George Stephenson, the steam engine entered on its final triumph.

George Stephenson

Steam Engine by George Stephenson 

The Stockton-Darlington railway was opened in 1823. During the next decade railway lines were laid down with feverish energy and within two years it was invested a lot of money in contraction.

The Stockton-Darlington Railway

Now the English  landscape changed and the Industrial Revolution, as it is generally understood, was over and a new age dawned in which  England become the richest and the most powerful nation of the world.

THE INVENTION OF THE STEAM ENGINES

The production of cheap cast iron stimulated the invention of various kinds of machinery. By far the most important was the discovery of James Watt of a steam engine which could employed for pumping coal-mines. Steam engines were soon in demand for all mining districts in England and orders came from different countries, such as France, Russia and Germany. 

In my research I discovered that in the early days of railways there were many claims that a horse and carriage were faster than a train. One such claim was put to the test and in 1830 the horse and carriage won, though it was not long before speed of the trains increased

Later, Britain became vitally in other matters as in other powers, so as to provide markets and raw materials. The Development of the new technologies that depended on raw materials found mostly in remote places, example the motor car depended on oil and rubber, and copper imported from Africa and South America.

 It is the one of the great turning points in the history of civilization.

In my research about the Industrial Revolution I found such interesting buildings which were built by ordinary people. During the Industrial Revolution iron was used to make engines, boats trains and bridges.

Interested that the first bridges were logs, slabs of stone or intertwined vines of ropes across narrow streams. The Romans were the first great bridge builders. The sane types of bridges were built in Europe until the end of the 18^th century, when iron and steel construction began. Infect the world’s first iron bridge was build at Coalbrookdale in England in 1779.

The Coalbrookdale Bridge

THE AGRICULTURAL REVOLUTION

In addition the Agricultural Revolution produce huge of profits for some farmers, so new schemes were to be financed at very low rates of interest. 

Farmers

The English farming was also undergoing a great change in this period. The smaller farms were unable to compete with improved but more costly methods of agriculture which required capital. Villagers, who had made use of common lands, lost their rights which they had held by custom from time to time. Gradually an army of unemployed was created and they naturally turned to the new industries that were in need of unskilled labor.

In addition the new mass of consumption of sugar,tea,coffee,cocoa and fruit led at the development of tropical plantations economies.

EMPLOYMENT OF CHILDREN IN WORKHOUSES

People in that era who had no money or couldn't work were sent to live in places called workhouses. These locations were like almost like prisons. Once you are in a workhouse this means that you have to work very long hours. It means to that it was hard to get out again. The sad thing was that families were split up hardly ever allowed to see each other.

It is strange and bitter irony that a period which vastly increased the wealth of this country should also have in testified the poverty of so many people. And because labor was plentiful it was cheap, and although prices rose steeply wages were virtually at starvation level.

Another sequel was the creation of workhouses, a large proportion of the inmate’s not which were children, they were taught a trade and then sent to the mills of Lancashire. There, were entirely defenseless and compelled to work long hours under strictly conditions.

Children Working in Workhouses 

WORKING IN THE MINES

The life of these people was not easy and they also believed that life can smile to them. In fact more than 6,500 coal mines in the United States, were small operations. More than 195,000 persons are employed directly in the coal industry.

Early coal mines were dark and dreadful places where men and boys worked long hours pick and shovel in damp, dusty cramped quarters. Woman and children were sometimes used to pull the heavy coal carts.

THE BEGINNING OF MASS PRODUCTION

Before the 1800 and the introduction of steam power in the English manufacturing, a factory ordinarily was defined as a commercial establishment under the absentee ownership and in charge of an agent. The beginning of the factory system largely replaced the cottage system in which workers made goods in their own tools although the materials were supplied by the merchant from whom the work was done.

The success of the modern factory was build on mass production

That means that the production of goods in large quantities.

So, with the coming of the industrial revolution, however things changes in their appearance. Inventors were active in the Textile industry. Weaving and spinning were handicrafts largely carried out in the homes of individual workers on a small scale. In the 18^th century, a series of English inventions revolutionized spinning and weaving techniques. This made England the leader of the textile industry.   

During the centuries before written records primitive man invented the basic devices and such techniques that assured the future. These inventions include such things such as tools, weapons and traps. Also include the wheel, the raft, pottery, the marked stick for measuring and the ways of making fire and smelting copper and iron.

 Also without iron and steel the way of life of civilized people would be entirely different. These metals are used in thousands of ways. They serve everybody in homes, public, automobiles,    trains, ships, machinery, mines, farm equipment and also bridges and buildings.

In fact the unknown inventors who helped create the early civilizations of Mesopotamia, Egypt and other famous ancient lands invented improved tools.

THE MACHINE AGE

The invention of the steam engine started in the 18^th century in England. This century designed for spinning, thread and weaving textiles. This opened the modern era of invention. The 19^th century brought a steady stream of devices and processes that are today granted.

There is a saying that says “Necessity is the mother of invention”

This is often true because when there is a need of something new, or for an improvement of an existing device or process inventors in many parts of the world will begin working to fill that need. As a result of this , history has many instances of several men independently inventing different inventions.;

Inventors

Until the 20^th century, most inventions were the work of individual inventors. Along the time as the technology become more complex, invention become more and more a group of effort financed by the government or such foundations.

FAMOUS INVENTORS

In fact the first  important  invention was John Kay’s  flying shuttle(1733) a device for moving the shuttle across the loom by a set of cords, instead of by hand. This made weaving so much faster that a yarn shortage soon developed.

John Kay

   The Flying Shuttle

Several inventors designed the spinning machines to replace the spinning wheel.

The inventor James Hargreaves invented the hand operated spinning jenny. He invented this about 1764. His invention was able to  spin a number of fine-but weak- yarns at the same time.

 James Hargreaves

 Spinning Jenny 

Reference...

- D.A Girling 1983, New Age Encyclopedia, Seventh Edition in Thirty Volume, Bay Books, Sydeny London.

- Walter Miller, ma, Litt, LL.D formely Deanof Gradate School and Professes of classical Languages and Archaeology University of Missouri, Walter Eckart, The universal World Reference Encyclopedia. 

- DE New Standard Encyclopedia Volume 4

- Virtue's, New Age Treasury, Volume1, A Pagent of History, London

- Usborne Publishing Ltd 2000, The USBORNE Internet- Linked Science Encyclopedia.