MACHINERY AND MANUFACTURES
=327. Development of agriculture.=—Pursuing now our survey of the
technical advances of the century, we must notice first the oldest
and perhaps the most important branch of production, agriculture.
An American reader does not need to be told that farm work has been
greatly changed by the introduction of improved tools and machinery.
Even an implement so old and apparently so simple as the plow will do
now better work with half the force formerly required. Cultivating
and harvesting machines of various kinds spare land and labor. The
introduction of artificial fertilizers has given new freedom and
efficiency to the agriculturist.
=328. Progress less in agriculture than in other branches of
production.=—Still, when all is said, agriculture is the branch of
production which has been affected least by the changes of the century.
The farmer is still bound to the soil and subject to the weather. Steam
power has not made for itself the place which sanguine men once thought
it would win. In Europe reforms have been effected in sweeping away
antiquated institutions affecting the personal liberty and property
rights of cultivators, who now, in free association, can work far more
efficiently than before. In other continents the extension of the
modern transportation system has effected a revolution in the choice
of crops and the means of marketing them. Neither transportation,
steam power, nor machinery, however, has vitally affected the methods
by which crops are grown; and when the first fertility of new land
has been exhausted and a growing population clamors for a cheap food
supply, the world will find that one of its great problems is still
unsolved.
=329. Function of machinery.=—For the great changes effected by the use
of steam we look, of course, not to agriculture but to manufactures and
transportation. These changes have been wrought through the medium of
machinery, and the reader is asked to give particular attention now to
the part which machinery plays in modern life. I spoke above of coal
as offering power to men. How can you apply this power to a useful
purpose? First, you must burn the coal under a boiler to produce steam;
second, you must translate the expansive power of steam into regular
forceful motion in an engine; finally, you must apply the force and the
motion in just the way that is wanted by means of a machine. Evidently
machinery does not depend altogether upon steam. Rude machines, mills
for grinding grain, for example, were run by wind or water power long
before the steam-engine was invented; water power is being transmitted
by electricity in increasing quantities at present; and men hope that
we shall be able to use the heat of the sun or the force of the tides
to run machinery in the future.
=330. Advantages of machines.=—Practically, however, the great
extension in the use of machinery has depended on the power obtained
from coal through steam. Only in the period since the adoption of
improved forms of steam-engine have we realized the possibilities
of machines. They can be applied only to certain classes of work,
especially that involving the constant repetition of an operation which
can be easily regulated either by the machine itself or by a laborer
supervising it. We can use machines, for instance, to make cloth
and even to make clothes, but we do not use them in the operations
of dressing and undressing. In their proper field, however, they
are indispensable. They will accomplish tasks which are too great
or too small for human hands. They repeat a process or copy a model
with absolute fidelity. They never grow tired and they have no human
failings; they often economize time and materials. Finally, and this
is the point of decisive importance, in many lines of work they,
furnish the product at a cost far below that of hand labor.
=331. Revolution in old industries effected by machinery.=—To describe
the manifold applications of machinery in the nineteenth century,
within the limits of this manual, is impossible. Let the reader glance
from the book to the objects surrounding him, and make a list of
the ten objects which first attract his attention. If he will trace
their history he will find, in all probability, that they are all the
products of complicated machinery, which has been developed from the
simplest beginnings in the course of the century. He will probably
experience difficulty in finding a familiar object which has not
been subjected to machine processes unknown in 1800. Machinery has
heightened human productivity in certain lines a hundred or even a
thousand fold. At the Atlanta Cotton Exposition of 1881, two carders,
two spinners, and one weaver, from the mountain region of Georgia,
could produce eight yards of coarse cotton cloth in a day of ten hours.
The same number of persons in a modern cotton factory could produce 800
yards by machinery. The cotton goods produced for home consumption in
the United States by 160,000 laborers at that time, would have required
the services of 16,000,000 laborers without machinery. Again, a skilful
woman can knit 80 stitches a minute by hand; a machine enables her to
make 480,000.
=332. Introduction of new industries.=—Machinery has not only
revolutionized old industries; it has created many new ones. A
distinguished American economist expressed the opinion, about 1890,
that half of all those who were then earning their living by industrial
pursuits did so in occupations that not only had no existence, but
which had not even been conceived of, a hundred years before. I may
write with a steel pen, with a fountain pen, or with a typewriter;
whichever choice I make I am giving employment to a group of mechanical
laborers who did not exist in 1800. Taking a particular city as an
example, the industrial specialities of Leipzig are said to have
increased from 118 in 1751 to 557 in 1890, a growth of 372 per
cent. Nor must we limit our view of the effects of machinery to the
mechanical pursuits which are carried on about us. Increased efficiency
due to the use of machinery has set men free from other pursuits to
engage in commerce, education, domestic service, etc.
=333. Importance of iron in the age of machinery.=—One particular
industry deserves special consideration here, by reason of the quality
of its product rather than of the quantity of laborers employed or
the mere exchange value of the output. Without iron the modern age of
machinery would be, at best, of stunted growth. Jevons characterized
admirably the modern industrial system when he said that steam is its
motive power and iron is the fulcrum and the lever. It is safe, I
think, to challenge the ordinary reader of the present day to name a
machine which is not composed largely or almost wholly of iron. The
whole structure of our modern industry depends on the means of getting
cheap iron. “Without it the engine, the spinning-jenny, the power-loom,
the gas- and water-pipe, the iron vessel, the bridge, the railway—in
fact, each one of our most important works—would be impracticable from
the want and cost of material.”
=334. Scarcity of iron before the nineteenth century.=—Returning to
the period about 1800 we find ourselves in a different world. I have
described in a previous chapter the improvements effected in the
manufacture of iron in the eighteenth century. Great as was the promise
of these improvements, it waited long for full realization; well into
the nineteenth century iron remained relatively scarce and dear and was
spared in every possible way. A youth destined to play a leading part
in the iron age (Joseph Nasmyth) visited the Carron Iron Works in 1823,
and here is the description which he gives of a celebrated foundry and
machine shop, associated with the construction of the first working
steam-engine by Watt. “Much of the machinery continued to be of wood.
Although effective in a general way it was monstrously cumbrous. It
gave the idea of vast power and capability of resistance, while it was
far from being so in reality.” If this was the condition at the Carron
Iron Works, what must it have been in ordinary factories?
=335. Development of machine tools for working iron.=—Iron was little
used, partly because it was hard to get and partly because it was hard
to work. There were in England about 1800 only three good machine
shops, where small steam-engines were built. The equipment of even the
best machine shop would seem now wretchedly inadequate, and Stephenson
was greatly hampered, in building his first locomotive, by the lack
of good machine tools, for working metals. William Fairbairn said in
his presidential address before the British Association at Manchester,
“When I first entered this city [about 1813] the whole of the machinery
was executed by hand. There were neither planing, slotting, nor
shaping machines; and, with the exception of very imperfect lathes,
and a few drills, the preparatory operations of construction were
effected entirely by the hands of the workmen.” About 1825 to 1830,
however, with the growth in demand for iron-working apparatus, there
began a rapid development of this branch of manufacture, one step in
advance leading rapidly to another. We may trace the process in the
description that Nasmyth gives us of his first machine shop, a shed
measuring 24 by 16 feet. “I removed thither my father’s foot-lathe, to
which I had previously added an excellent slide-rest of my own making.
I also added a ‘slow motion,’ which enabled me to turn cast-iron and
cast-steel portions of my great Mandsley lathe. I soon had the latter
complete and in action. Its first child was a planing machine capable
of executing surfaces in the most perfect style; it was 3 feet long by
1 foot 8 inches wide. Armed with these two most important and generally
useful tools, and by some special additions, such as boring machines
and drilling machines, I soon had a progeny of legitimate descendants
crowded about my little workshop, so that I often did not know which
way to turn.” Nasmyth himself made one specially important contribution
to iron-working machinery, by the invention of the steam hammer
in 1839; the old “bit by bit” system of welding became henceforth
unnecessary.
=336. Steel, character and utility.=—While the limits of our space will
not permit us to trace further the development of machine tools, which
have been made marvelously efficient in recent years, and while we must
also forego a study of the details of iron production, the topic of
steel manufacture certainly deserves some consideration. Ordinary cast
iron, while strong and hard enough for many purposes, still is brittle
by reason of the large proportion of carbon and other impurities
which it contains. These impurities may be burned out in the puddling
process, and the nearly pure iron thus obtained, called malleable
or wrought iron, has a toughness enabling it to resist far greater
strains than cast iron can stand. Intermediate between the two irons,
and containing one per cent of carbon, more or less, is still another
product, steel, which may be made even more tenacious than wrought
iron, or even harder than cast iron. Its peculiar property of “taking
a temper” is probably known to most readers. The valuable properties
of steel have been known and prized for ages, but till well into the
nineteenth century it could be used only sparingly; it was commonly
manufactured by first making wrought iron, by the tedious process of
puddling, and then heating the iron bars in contact with charcoal until
they had absorbed the proper amount of carbon. The expense of this
process prohibited the use of steel for most purposes; the wrought iron
cost $75 a ton and the finished steel $250 or more; and the output
would seem to-day inconsiderable.
=337. Recent improvements in the manufacture of steel; the Bessemer
process.=—Many men have contributed to bring the manufacture of steel
to its present efficiency, and we may notice only the names associated
with the greatest improvements. An Englishman, Bessemer, patented in
1855 the idea, as simple as it is ingenious, of turning cast iron
directly into steel by blowing air through it when melted, and so
consuming the excess of carbon. It has not proved possible to make
good steel according to Bessemer’s original idea, but with a slight
modification his process has been wonderfully successful; in present
practice all the carbon is burned out by the air current, and then
the requisite amount is added before the metal is poured out. Ore
containing a large amount of phosphorus is treated by melting it in
a converter lined with lime, which removes this dangerous impurity
(“basic process”).
=338. The open-hearth (Siemens-Martin) process.=—Still another
contribution to modern methods of steel manufacture, known as
the “open-hearth,” or, from the names of its introducers, the
Siemens-Martin process, has been of great importance since about 1870.
The steel is made from ore or from a combination of different kinds of
iron, and, by peculiar devices for economizing the heat of the furnace,
the process may be continued so long and regulated so carefully that
a product of high quality may be turned out at a moderate cost. The
result of all these processes has been to change steel from a luxury to
a necessity of modern life. Modern mild steel is 40 per cent stronger
than iron, and is tough enough to be tied in a knot or punched in
the shape of a bowl when cold. The increase in efficiency due to its
substitution for iron in machinery, railroads, ships, and structural
work is simply incalculable.
=339. Development of the modern chemical industry.=—In detailing at
such length as I have done the exploits of machinists in the past
century, I may tempt the reader to undervalue the contributions of
scientists. To guard against that error let us consider briefly the
development of the chemical industry, which, like the iron industry,
renders a service to modern civilization beyond any measure of dollars
and cents. The Frenchman, Lavoisier, had established chemistry on a
scientific basis before 1800, but industrial chemistry used still the
primitive methods which had been employed for ages. Let us take, for
instance, the single substance, carbonate of soda, of prime importance
in industrial chemistry, for on it depend the various industries of
glass, pottery, soap, photography, paper, etc. This substance was
still obtained in the eighteenth century, by burning seaweed and
seashore plants and treating their ashes; Spain had a considerable
export of barilla, and owed to this product whatever success she
attained in the soap manufacture. Leblanc emancipated the soda industry
from kelp and barilla, by introducing the process based on sulphuric
acid and salt; step by step improvements have been made since then.
Sulphuric acid, discarded in the soda industry, has grown in importance
notwithstanding; it is the controlling element in the manufacture
of other acids, commercial fertilizers, alum, ether, glucose, etc.,
and in oil refining; and it is produced at a price and of a quality
formerly unknown. The discovery of the anilin colors, in 1859, has
revolutionized the art of dyeing. The chemist will make you, from coal
tar, almost any color or shade desired. He will make you perfumes or
flavors; and, if he has failed to construct quinine artificially, he
has at least learned, in his attempts, to make substances such as
antipyrin and phenacetin, of equal value for other purposes.
=340. Influences determining the local distribution of manufactures.=—A
review of the contents of this chapter, with its discussion of the
factors which have built up modern industry, should suggest to the
reader the countries which have enjoyed exceptional advantages in the
modern manufacturing period. Resources of coal and iron, clearly, are
of great importance. That they are not decisive, however, is proved
by the absence of modern manufactures in China, where there are
abundant supplies of coal and iron, and their presence in districts
like the North of Ireland, where, for instance, a great ship-building
industry is fed with imported iron and coal. Factories can exist at a
considerable distance from their source of supply if they are served
by a transportation system which will fetch raw materials and carry
finished products cheaply; efficient transportation is essential.
Many other elements might be suggested as going to form the basis of
national success in manufactures, but of them all I desire here to
emphasize only two: good government and intelligent men. Manufactures
cannot thrive in a country where unwise or corrupt methods of taxation
rob the investor of his gains. Nor can they prosper, whatever other
advantages a country may have, if it lacks intelligent and steady
laborers, or clear-sighted and energetic leaders. The reader will
have an opportunity, in later chapters, to test the truth of these
statements; meanwhile, in anticipation, attention may be directed to
the United States, England, and Germany, as those countries which have
most signally proved their fitness for manufacturing.
QUESTIONS AND TOPICS
1. Development of the science and art of agriculture in the nineteenth
century. [Encyclopedia.]
2. Artificial fertilizers. [Peacock, in Cosmopolitan Magazine, Nov.,
1895.]
3. A modern wheat farm. [Scribner’s Magazine, 1897, vol. 22, p. 531
ff.; Edgar, Story of a grain of wheat. Note that “bonanza” farms are
not typical of modern agriculture in general.]
4. What use is coal without a steam-engine? What use is machinery
without a steam-engine? What use is a steam-engine without coal
or machinery? Which would the world give up most readily, coal,
steam-engine, or machinery?
5. Character and advantages of machinery. [Hobson, Mod. cap., chap. 3,
sects. 1-3.]
6. How much have women gained by being relieved of the necessity
of making cloth for family use? [Read description of the labor of
spinning, weaving, etc., in colonial times; see Alice M. Earle,
Colonial dames and goodwives, Boston, 1895, or Syndey G. Fisher, Men,
women and manners in colonial times. Philadelphia, 1898.]
7. Effect of the introduction of machinery on the demand for labor in
different occupations. [Hobson, Mod. cap., chap. 8.]
8. The growth of factories. [Bourne, Romance, chap. 9.]
9. Organization of a modern factory. [P. G. Hubert, The business of
a factory, Scribner’s Magazine, 1897, vol. 21, p. 306 ff.; Fred J.
Miller, The machinist, same, 1893, vol. 14, p. 314 ff.]
10. Progress in the iron manufacture. [Iles, chap. 4; R. R. Bowker, A
bar of iron, Harper’s Magazine, 1893-4, 88: 408-424, F. W. Taussig,
The iron industry in the U. S., Quarterly Journal of Economics. Feb.,
1900, reprinted in Bullock’s Selected Readings in Economics.]
11. Development of machine tools for iron working. [Sellers, in Depew,
One hund. years, chap. 49.]
12. Progress in the steel manufacture. [R. R. Bowker, A steel tool,
Harper’s Magazine, 1893-4, 88: 587-602; Waldon Fawcett, The center of
the world of steel, Century Magazine, 1901, 62: 189-203.]
13. Write a biographical sketch of one of the following: Bessemer,
Siemens, Whitworth, Brown, Thomas, Snelus. [W. T. Jeans, The creators
of the age of steel, N. Y., 1884.]
14. Write a report on advances in the manufacture of one of the
articles named. [Encyclopedias; on coal tar products see Meldola.]
15. What conditions have led to the rise of the characteristic
manufactures of your own vicinity? In what regions are their chief
competitors? What are the relative advantages of different places with
respect to some particular manufacture?
BIBLIOGRAPHY
See the previous chapter for books of general reference. The modern
manufacturing organization and the influence of machinery have been
treated, from the economic standpoint, by Hobson, Modern capitalism,
and Schulze-Gaevernitz, The cotton trade, Manchester, 1895. A history
and analysis of the factory system by C. D. Wright was published
in the Tenth U. S. Census, 1880, vol. 2; further references to U.
S. public documents will be given below, in the chapters on the
United States. The English parliamentary papers and accounts contain
an immense amount of material on this subject; the last volume of
Cunningham, Growth, has useful references to them. The technical
history of manufacturers defies compression. Much interesting material
may be found in the reports of the U. S. Commissioners to various
world expositions.
A good account of the history of machine making is provided by Joseph
W. Roe, **English and American tool builders, New Haven. Yale Univer.
Press, 1916.