The statements made in this discussion that the great expansion in the
production of manufactures came with the adoption of machinery for
manufacturing must not be understood as meaning that no machinery was
used in manufacturing prior to the period of expansion. Machines have
been used in manufacturing for many centuries.
The spinning wheel, used many hundred years ago, was a machine, and so
was the hand loom, by which the threads spun by the wheel were woven
into cloth. Flax and wool were originally turned into thread by the
use of the distaff, a stick to which the spinner attached a small
portion of the fiber, and by revolving the stick against his body
twisted the fibers into a thread. Then by letting the end of the stick
drop downward he drew out the thread, and with another roll of the
stick against his body again twisted the fibers and lengthened the
thread, which he then wound around the distaff. After many years of
this process it occurred to somebody that by setting the distaff in a
frame and passing a cord or a piece of rawhide around it and also
around a large wheel and turning the wheel he could get a much more
rapid and regular revolution of the distaff. This was the beginning of
the use of the “machine” in the making of yarn, for the spinning wheel
was a machine, of a crude type, to be sure, but a machine. This served
many generations of men and women for the manufacture of thread and
yarn, from flax, from wool and from cotton.
To turn this thread or yarn into cloth another “machine” was used, the
loom, which, by fixing the thread on certain frames and passing other
threads back and forth as the frames were raised or lowered, formed
the cloth. But this “machine,” the loom, was operated by human power,
as was that other machine, the spinning wheel. The women and children
spun the thread or yarn, the father and sons operated the loom, 194
chiefly in the winter months in which they had no occupation in the
fields. If a man chose to give his time to weaving and became a weaver
by trade he lightened his heavy labors at times by attention to the
garden surrounding his workshop, performing the necessary work for the
production of his food supply. “The workshop of the weaver,” says Ure
in his History of the Cotton Manufactures, “was a rural cottage from
which, when he was tired of the sedentary labor, he could sally forth
into his little garden and with the spade or hoe attend to his
culinary products. The cotton which was to form his weft was picked
clean by the fingers of his younger children and was carded and spun
by the older girls assisted by his wife, and the yarn was woven by
himself assisted by his sons.” In the manufacture of woolen goods
conditions were similar. “The work,” says James in his History of the
Worsted Manufactures, “was entirely domestic, and its different
branches widely scattered over the country. The manufacturer had to
travel on horseback to purchase his wool among the farmers or at the
great fairs or markets, and the wool, after being sorted and combed,
was distributed among the peasantry and received back as yarn. The
machine used by them was still the old one-thread spinning wheel, and
in summer weather on many a village green might be seen the housewives
plying their busy trade. Returning with his yarn the manufacturer had
to seek out his weavers, who ultimately delivered to him his camelets
or russells or calimancoes ready for sale to the merchant or delivery
to the dyer.”
These are pictures of the manufacturing industry in England as late as
1770. “Machines” were in use, but of the simplest type, and all
operated by the power of the man or woman using them, or at the best
by human or animal power, and in most cases the work was performed in
the household or a small shop adjoining the household.
The transformation to the “machine method” or factory system began 195
when some power greater than that of man or beast was applied to the
operation of the machines, and the machines themselves were so
enlarged as to multiply their producing power. “In tracing the effect
of the application of modern machinery to English industry,” says
Hobson in his Evolution of Modern Capitalism, “there appear two
prominent factors, the growth of improved mechanical apparatus, and
the evolution of extra-human motor power. We speak of the industry
which has prevailed since the middle of the eighteenth century as
‘machine production’ not because there were no machines before that
time but, firstly, because a vast acceleration in the invention of
complex machinery applied to almost all industrial arts dates from
that period, and secondly, because the application upon an extended
scale of non-human motor powers manifested itself then for the first
time.” “The water frame, the carding engine, and the other machines
which Arkwright brought out, in a finished state,” says Cooke Taylor
in his History of the Factory System, “required both more space than
could be found in a cottage and more power than could be applied by
the human arm. Their weight required them to be placed in strongly
built walls, and they could not be advantageously turned by any power
then known but that of water. Further, the use of machinery was
accompanied by a greater division of labor, and therefore a greater
co-operation was necessary to bring all the processes under a central
supervision.”
The new and enlarged machines which were thus operated by water power
and brought together in factories had been invented chiefly during the
eighteenth century. John Kay, in 1738, invented what was known as the
flying shuttle, which doubled the amount of weaving which could be
performed by one man in a given time. Hargreaves, in 1764, invented 196
the spinning jenny, a machine which operated a number of spindles for
spinning yarn, and so did many times as much as one spinner with a
spinning wheel could do. Arkwright, a few years later, devised the
water frame, by which the spinning jenny could be operated by water
power. Crompton, a little later developed the “spinning mule,” which
combined the important qualities of the spinning jenny and the water
frame. Before the end of the century the steam engine began to supply
power and was utilized in many cases where water power was not
available. Then, in 1792, came Whitney’s cotton gin, by which the
seeds were readily extracted from the cotton, and that valuable fiber
rendered much more available for manufacturing purposes.
The effect of the development of the machine and factory system,
through the devices of these thoughtful men, enormously increased the
manufacturing industries of England and later of the other parts of
the world. The importations of cotton into England prior to the
invention of the spinning jenny averaged less than 2 million pounds
per annum. With the invention of the spinning jenny and the water
frame the importation of cotton and cotton manufacture quickly doubled
and trebled and then grew at such rapid rate that by 1800 the
importation was about 40 million pounds, by 1830, 260 million pounds
and by 1840 over 400 million pounds. The importation of wool grew from
less than 2 million pounds in the latter part of the eighteenth
century to 150 million pounds in 1860 and over 700 million pounds in
1890, though in this article of manufacture the growth in importation
was less strongly marked than in cotton because of the fact that much
of the wool used in manufacture was produced at home, while all of the
cotton used was imported.
In the iron and steel industry the growth in the use of machinery was
even more closely connected with the great development of recent years
than in that of textiles. It was quite natural that man should seek 197
the use of machinery in the iron and steel industry. The material to
be handled was of such great weight that it could not be handled in
quantities without the aid of extra-human power, and the fact that it
must be manipulated while at an intense heat necessitated the use of
devices of some sort for its handling. Yet a long time, a very long
time, elapsed after the beginning of the manufacture of iron and steel
before men developed the machinery which has resulted in such a
wonderful development in the manufacture. The slow rate of growth in
the earlier centuries, and the rapid rate in the past century may be
measured in some degree by the world’s production of pig iron, the
basis of all iron and steel manufactures. Mulhall estimates the
world’s production of pig iron in the year 1500 at 60,000 tons, in
1700 at 100,000 tons, and in 1800 at 460,000 tons. Then the increase
began to be more sharply defined, the production reaching 1 million
tons in 1820, 2½ million in 1840, 7 million in 1860, 18 million in
1880, 40 million in 1900 and nearly 60 million in 1907. The increase
in the eighteenth century was about one third of a million tons, and
that of the nineteenth century was 39½ million tons, or more than
100 times as much as that of the eighteenth century. The great
development in the transformation of iron into steel did not come
until the second half of the nineteenth century, the world’s
production of steel in 1850 being, according to Mulhall, 71,000 tons,
in 1870, 540,000 tons, in 1880, 4 million tons, in 1890,12 million, in
1900, approximately 20 million, and in 1907 about 40 million. The
growth in production of pig iron and steel was more rapid in Europe
than in the United States in the earlier part of the nineteenth
century, but in the latter part of that century the United States
outstripped all her rivals, and her production of iron and steel is
now more than that of any other two countries of the world.
These wonderful developments in the production of iron and steel were 198
even more dependent upon the development of machinery for transporting
the material and handling it in the factory than was the case with the
textiles. Pig iron cannot be made without having in immediate
conjunction three natural materials, iron ore, limestone and some
material to produce intense heat. The iron is only found in the form
of “ore,” being iron mixed with rocks, earth or other matter which
must be removed in order to use the iron. To do this the ore must be
heated. Formerly this was done by placing small quantities of charcoal
in a hole in the ground and placing the iron on top of it, and then
more charcoal on top of the ore. By fanning the burning charcoal or
blowing the fire from the lungs through a reed the heat was increased
and the ore was softened, and by hammering it while hot the useless
material was worked out. Then by further heatings it could be hammered
into such form as desired. After a while it occurred to men to build a
wall of stones and mud and place the ore and charcoal in this, and to
make a bellows of the skin of some animal (the prototype of those
which blacksmiths and other workers in metals now use), and so force
the air into the bottom of the mass of charcoal and iron. With this
the iron could be so heated that it actually melted and ran to the
bottom of the furnace, and when cooled was ready for the finer
processes by which it was made into the desired articles. After a time
the walls of the furnace were built higher and if it could be located
near to a waterfall the shaft of the water wheel was so adjusted as to
operate the bellows and keep the stream of air flowing into the fire,
for the heat of the burning charcoal was not sufficient to melt the
iron without this forced draft.
This was the process by which men made iron for many generations. But
it was a very expensive process, for the quantity of wood which must
be used to produce the charcoal was so great that the forests were 199
soon depleted, especially in England, where iron making became active.
Efforts were made to use coal instead of charcoal, but the weight of
the iron ore was so great that it crushed out the fire in the coal
which softened as it burned. Then after a time it occurred to somebody
to treat the coal in a manner somewhat similar to that by which the
wood had been transformed into charcoal, and coke was produced and
successfully substituted for charcoal in heating the iron ore and
making iron.
In the United States the charcoal process was used until a period much
later than that of its abandonment in England, for the supplies of
timber were very great and men who were clearing the land for use in
agriculture were glad to turn the wood into charcoal and find a market
for it. The simple charcoal furnace and forced draft by a simple
process furnished the iron-making systems of the world until the early
part of the nineteenth century. As a result there were hundreds of
small furnaces, simply operated, and turning out small quantities of
iron, in various sections of the United States. Meantime somebody
discovered that if the air which was forced into the furnace was
heated before being sent into the fire it would greatly increase the
heat-giving power of a given quantity of charcoal or coke, and the hot
blast became a part of the larger furnaces. Then it was found that the
anthracite coal of the United States was hard enough to bear the
weight of the ore and would produce a heat sufficiently intense to
melt it; and so a great iron industry developed in the anthracite
region of the United States. Then it was found that certain bituminous
coal in western Pennsylvania would make excellent coke for the
manufacture of iron, and the Connellsville coke became a successful
competitor of anthracite coal, and later other cokes were also used.
Later came the natural gas discoveries and they contributed to iron
making and working. Meantime railways were built to carry the ore to 200
the coal or the coal to the ore or both the ore and coal to some
convenient meeting point, and machinery began to be introduced for
handling the ore and the coal along the railway and at the furnace.
This led to the devising of other machinery for handling the iron
after it left the furnace and of rollers for rolling the iron into
bars and for giving it the sort of manipulation that the hammer of the
earlier iron maker had given it when produced in the primitive
furnaces. Then great deposits of iron ore, the richest known to the
world, were discovered in the Lake Superior regions; and steam-driven
machinery was devised to scoop it up from the beds in which it was
found, place it in cars, which in turn carried it to the water’s edge,
and dumped it into great receptacles from which it could run by the
force of gravity into the hold of the steamer. Then other machinery
operated by steam was devised to take it from the hold of the steamer
and load it again on the cars which transported it to the furnace
where it met the coal or the coke, produced, transported and handled
by similar machine processes, and was turned into iron to also be
handled by great machines.
While all this was happening--indeed long before the later happenings
above mentioned--workers in iron had found that the pig iron coming
from the furnaces contained so much carbon that it could not be
successfully worked. So they managed to get rid of the carbon, by
melting the iron in an open hearth and passing flames over it, and as
the carbon is combustible it was gradually burned out. This made soft
malleable iron, but not of the consistency to have the required
strength or serve the purposes that are now served by steel. To bring
it to the proper condition it was necessary to reintroduce a very
small quantity of carbon so evenly that both the quantity and the
distribution could be determined. This was done for many years by
placing the bars of iron in a crucible or other closed receptacle 201
surrounded by charcoal, and subjecting them to intense heat for
several hours or days. So the making of steel was a slow and expensive
process until about the middle of the nineteenth century. Then Sir
Henry Bessemer, an Englishman, discovered that by forcing air into the
bottom of a great retort containing molten iron the oxygen of the air
would combine with the carbon of the iron and in a few minutes the
objectionable carbon would be all burned out, and that by then
reintroducing in this molten mass of pure iron the required amount of
carbon in the form of spiegel iron or ferro manganese, steel could be
made much more cheaply and quickly than before. William Kelly, an
American, also devised a similar process about the same time. Thus
began the process of modern steel making, which has in a single half
century increased tenfold the world’s consumption of steel and thus of
iron, for a very large proportion of the iron now utilized in the
world is transformed into steel before being applied to the service
which it is to perform for men.
In all the processes by which iron and steel making have been
transformed from the simple methods of a century or two centuries ago
to the present system by which a single establishment may now make in
a week or month or year as much iron or steel as the whole world then
made in an equal length of time, machinery and capital have been the
great causes of the development--machinery for digging iron and coal,
for transporting them to the place of manufacture, for handling the
material in the natural state, for handling it in the furnace, for
handling it in the molten state, for rolling and shaping it after it
passes from the molten state to that in which it begins to take the
form of the finished product, and capital to purchase this machinery
and the great quantities of material required. “The very richness of
our resources,” says J. Russell Smith in The Story of Iron and Steel,
“has made such a wealth of opportunity for occupation in the United
States that labor is and has been scarce. As a consequence the 202
American iron industry has been driven over to a machine basis, and
its very success has arisen from the fact that a scarcity of labor has
compelled the introduction of machinery which has surpassed the dreams
of its inventors. In the iron and steel industry of America man does
little more than touch levers, while the balance is done by steam and
electricity. Four large Bessemer converters, holding 15 or 20 tons of
molten iron do their work by an air blast driven through the molten
material by the force of an engine. The electric cranes swing the
20-ton charges and the heavy converters as easily as a schoolboy
swings his dinner pail, and pours the new made steel into a metal mold
which stands on a tram ready to take it to the hydraulic machine which
draws the mold off the red-hot ingot. The manless way in which this
great steel ingot is turned into a useful piece of steel never ceases
to be a marvel. The great machines are seen but the plant seems to be
deserted. Then there arises a rumble and roaring noise and the great
piece of red-hot metal is seen to travel with all the independence of
a serpent across a lot of black rollers and dive into the jaws of the
rollers which squeeze it into flatter shape. Then it stops, turns over
and dives again through the same rollers, which flatten it still more.
After this has been repeated a few times you discover, standing on a
high platform, a man or two pulling the levers which start the
machinery of the six or seven thousand horsepower engines that drive
the knowing rollers which are crushing and rolling the ingot into the
shapes which man can use.”
“Perhaps the greatest difference between English and American steel
works,” said an English writer on this subject, “is the absence of
laborers in the American mills. The large and growing employment of
propelling and directing machinery is responsible for this. In a mill
rolling three thousand tons of rails in a day not a dozen men are to 203
be seen on the mill floor. To witness in such a mill the conversion in
a half hour of a red-hot steel ingot weighing several tons into
finished stamped steel rails ninety feet long, and all this perfectly,
by the agency of unseen hands, is to gain new ideas of the
possibilities of mechanism, of the subservience of matter to mind.”
These are some of the steps by which the systems of the manufacturing
world have been, in the past 150 years, transformed from household
work, or that of the small shop, into that of the factory--and the
factory developed into enormous establishments through the investment
of great sums of money in the purchase and installation of
ever-improving machinery, more ingenious, more productive, more
costly, but turning out more and better of the finished product with
each new device and new investment of capital.