Before the industrial revolution, slaves and women were depended upon as a source of cheap labor to work outside in fields and to make clothes or other textiles respectively. With the help of the Industrial Revolution though, it would not always remain this way. The Industrial Revolution first started in Britain during the eighteenth century. During this time in Britain there were a lots of new inventions circulating that made every day simple tasks simpler and factories became a more common place of work. (Williams.) As the great new technological innovations of inventive minds spread to other parts of the world, like the United States, it switched from being an agricultural based society to a manufacturing based one. With these innovations …show more content…
Each of these men contributed something great to the textile industry and changed how it would run from then on. Even though Samuel Slater was born and lived in England for a long period of time, he is consider to be the founder of the cotton textile industry in the United States by many economic historians. Slater was born on June 9, 1768 in Belper, Derbyshire, England and when he became old enough, he was employed as an apprentice to the owner of a textile factory. There he learned the trades of the business which would later influence his own endeavors. American inventor Eli Whitney was born on December 8, 1765 in Westborough, Massachusetts and from an early age he had an affinity for machines. Even during his teen years he showed initiative, that would lead to great things later on in the revolution, when he constructed a workshop that manufactured nails, hinges, and metal parts. Another great inventor during this time was Elias Howe, who was born on July 9, 1819 in Spencer, Massachusetts. Much like Samuel Slater, Howe was also an apprentice at a machine shop which propelled him into an industrial innovator.