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Thomas Cotchett and George Sorocold built a silk mill powered by waterwheel
picture sourcesite This was Britain's first factory, a single establishment with complex machinery. It was a source of power and accomodation for workers. It was built in Derby, England. This was a crucial turning point leaning towards the Industrial Revolution. -
Thomas Newcomen perfects the steam engine
picture sourcesite Thomas Newcomen perfected the steam engine. It was the first practical machine that harnessed the power of steam to create mechanical work. It was used during the 1800s to pump the water out of mines. Before him, a rather great amount of steam machines were made, but were basicaly novelties. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newcomen_steam_engine -
John Kay invents the fly-shuttle
picture sourcesite The hand loom operator pulled the shuttle. It carried the woof from one side of the warp to the other. Kay used hammers which proppelled the shuttle back and forth between threads. It was repeated until cloth was made. -
James Hargreaves invents the spinning jenny
picture sourcesiteIn the 18th century, spinning and weaving were big deals and were home-based. Hargreaves was watching his wife spin thread and realized he could build something that could spin ten at a time, of course being much more efficient. When he invented it, he wanted it to be secret, but it eventually spread that such a tool had been invented. Believe it or not, Hargreaves was not a good business man whatsoever. Other businessmen stole his idea very often without credit given to him. -
Samuel Crompton invents machine for making yarn to make muslin
picture sourcesite Until then, muslin, depicted at left, was imported from India. It was known as the muslin wheel, the muslin machine, hall-in-the-wood wheel, or the spinning mule. It basically was the predecessor to the water-powered loom. Dr. Edmund Cartwright invented the water-powered loom. -
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The actual timespan of the Industrial Revolution
The Industrial Revolution began in Great Britain in the 1780s and took several decades to spread to other Western nations. Several factors contributed to make Great Britain the starting place. Agriculture had changed so it could feed more at less cost. Food was more abundant. The British had a ready supply of money to invest in industry. -
James Watt improves steam engine
picture sourceHe made the machine able to drive machinery. Steam power could now be used to spin cotton and weave it, too. Before long, these were found everywhere in Britain. Because steam engines were fired by coal, they did not need to be located near rivers. -
Edmund Cartwright invents the water-powered loom
picture sourcesite It was steam-powered (which is water) and it manufactured cloth. It was a machine that needed improvement and did receive it in later years. Francis Cabot, along with William Horrocks, the man who invented the variable speed batton, made the water-powered loom more efficient. Its creation allowed the wholesale manufacture of cloth from ginned cotton. -
First steam-powered locomotive in Britain
picture sourceIn 1804, the first steam-powered locomotive ran on an industrial rail-line in Britain. It pulled 10 tons (9 t) of ore and 70 people at 5 miles (8.05 km) per hour. Better locomotives followed. One called the Rocket was used on the first public railway line, which opened in 1830 and extended 32 miles (51.5 km) from Liverpool to Manchester, England. -
Robert Fulton (America) builds the first paddle-wheel steamboat
site The Clermont, the first commercially successful steamboat. The Clermont was a segway to the era of tranportation. Its first successful trip was 150 miles in the Hudson River. The Clermont was not ther first steamboat ever, but was simply the first one to do well financially. -
Railroads come into play in the United States of America
By the time 1830 rolled around, railroads did, too. It began with fewer than 100 miles. That's about the distance from Foley to Mobile and back; that was all that was in the entire United States! By 1860, around 3,000 times that much was in the United States! Railroads turned America into the greatest market for manufactured goods.
