Chapter 32

The Early Industrial

Revolution
 Prerequisites for
Industrial Production
• Upsurge in world trade
– Colonies: new markets, new exports
– Intra-European trade also grew
• Rising population
– In most of the Continent and England
– Death rate fell, birth rate rose
• Increased money flow
– Money needed to finance purchasing
– Building new factories, port facilities, warehouses
– Capital raised by stocks, partnerships, issue of paper money
• Experienced manages and entrepreneurs
– London, Antwerp, Amsterdam
– Experience in organizing, managing large businesses
 Agriculture and Industry
• Agrarian improvements
– Crop yields had to increase to feed growing urban workforce
– High-yield New World crops (potato) revolutionized output
– Most important step was enclosing open fields
– Use of fertilizer, crop rotation, hybrid seeds, land drainage
– Landowners began producing for market: agrarian capitalism
• Changes in Mechanized Production
– Main idea: lessen unit cost of production through improved
technology
– Consumption changes due to more, cheaper familiar products,
not new items
– Most early industrial products were variations on previously
hand-worked items
– Sophisticated or new products came only gradually
 The Factory
• Putting-out system
– People take in raw material, work it into finished
product
– Same entrepreneur supplies raw materials, finds
workers, collects final product
– He bears all risks, gets all profits
– Wages were important to rural families
• Factory system
– Extremely important in changing lifestyles
– Entrepreneur brings many people under one roof to
work
– Paid on fixed scale, under tight discipline
– Employees no longer had any say over production
 Why England Led the
Industrial Revolution
• Entrepreneurial
- The English were the Western world's most experienced traders and
entrepreneurs.
- The English colonies were spread around the world, and the North
American colonies were the biggest markets for goods outside Europe.
• Population increase
- English population rose about 15 percent per decade through-out the
eighteenth century
• New source of energy: steam
- English steam engines opened the path to industrialized production of
goods.
• Agricultural improvements
• Key raw materials
- England controlled much of the two basic raw materials
of early industry: coal and cotton.
• Transportation network
- England had the most favorable internal transport
system.
• Variety of mechanical inventions:
perfected the steam engine
Society and Economy
Spread of the Industrial Revolution
• Why Industrial Revolution spread slowly at first
– No other country had all essential advantages
– England tried to keep techniques secret
– Napoleonic wars disrupted commerce, communications
• Continent began to industrialize about 1830
– Belgium, France
– Rhine River Valley
• Eastern Europe, Russia, Iberia ( Spain and Portugal)
almost untouched
– Lacked at least one of the essential factors
– Became permanent clients of industrial nations
• Industrialization was neither automatic nor inevitable
 Railroads
• Britain led the way
• New invention, spread rapidly
• The first commercial use of steam
railroading was in 1830, when a line
connected Liverpool and Manchester
• By 1860s, Many private railroads were
bankrupt, taken over by government
• Steam locomotive was heart of system
• Greatly reduced costs of shipping, travel,
and increased security
Map 32.1
Phases of the Industrial Revolution
• First Industrial Revolution, 1760-1820
– British dominance
– Energy supplied by steam
– Produced textiles, iron
• Second Industrial Revolution, later 19th C
– Leadership shifted to Germany, U.S.
– Energy supplied by electricity
– Chemical, petroleum industries
• Third Industrial Revolution, present day
– Spread to many countries
– Older industrial countries have moved to post-industrial
society
– Manufacturing replaced by services, information
Map 32.2
 The Structure of the
Family and Household
Major changes in family structure mid-18th C
- before industry
Three noticeable changes:
1. Lowering of marriage age (27 to 22/23.5)
2. Increase in number of wedlock children in
towns, but soon in rural areas
3. Increase in aged persons (over 60) who
had to be cared for by younger
generations
Children in the Industrial Revolution
• Place of children before 18th C
– People didn’t care closely for young children – too likely they
would die from disease, famine, accidents
– Peasants, workers saw children as a drain, not an asset
– Urban and wealthy classes also distant
– Children were social security for parents’ old age
• Change 1750-1850
– More love, tenderness toward newborns, youngsters
– Why?
• Declining child mortality rates
• More middle class, who valued children for what they were
• Influence of educational reformers
– State-supervised, funded schools provided general public
education
 Relations between
Men and Women
• Social relations more free (premarital sex)
• Harder for some women to marry
– Fewer eligible males
– Women often badly exploited
 Occupations and Mobility
• Increasing numbers in urban occupations, non-manual
work
– Farm laborers displaced, forced to move to cities
– A few took up skilled trades or non-manual work, moved up
social scale
– Very real threat of unemployment, even starvation
• Female occupations
– Could stay at home, hope to marry, or work as domestic
servants
– Many servants remained this for life
– Increasingly, women could work at machinery
• Replaced males in unskilled jobs
• Worked for lower wages
• Many women preferred factory work to domestic service
THE MIGRATION TO THE CITIES:
URBANIZED STUDY
• Urban migration motives
– Curiosity and desire for change
– Desire to improve economic, social status
– Desire to find better marital partners
• Towns grew in spite of lack of local food production
• Urban growth
– Huge increases - 1851, majority of population was urban
– New industry, manufacturing concentrated in smaller towns –
cheap land, close to raw materials
• Urban classes
– Nobility
– Upper middle class – bourgeoisie
– Lower middle class
– Working class
 Diet and Nutrition
• Pre-Revolution
– Uneven mix of different foods
– Local famines commonplace
– No transportation network to move food
• Considerable improvement by 1800
– Improved transportation
– More productive agricultural methods
– More grain from eastern Europe
– Potatoes, dairy products, meat, fish added
• Impact on health
– Wealthy protein-rich diets more balanced
– Poor had potatoes
– More fruits, vegetables for middle classes
 Public Health
• Medical, surgical conditions changed little
– Doctors not getting formal training, much quackery
– Modern medical theories still unknown
– Conditions for mentally ill barely beginning to improve
• Housing, sanitation
– Overcrowding in cheap rental housing
– Even most basic sanitation was missing
– No privacy at all
• Reason for growth in towns: migration
 Living Standards
• Gap between rich and poor widened
• Wealthy: self-indulgent lifestyle, great wealth seen as
reward for merit
• Middle classes: more modest, devoted energies to their
businesses
• Working classes: extremely hard time, increased poverty
• Reforms and improvements
– Began attacking worst of abuses
– Factory Acts limited child labor, required education
– Working class families resisted; needed child income
– Little done to improve sanitation until cholera epidemic;
convinced middle classes that reform was to their advantage
 Discussion Questions
1. The Industrial Revolution is one of a handful of
“watershed” events in history, events for which there
are drastic and permanent changes and a clear
“before” and “after.” Specifically, what were the social
and economic changes – what was the pre-
revolutionary situation and how did it change? What
social group experienced the most change? What
changes were those? Be specific.

2. The Industrial Revolution was not a single event, but

rather three sequential revolutions: the First, Second,
and Third Industrial Revolutions. How would you
compare each to the other; how did goals, inventions,
scope and spread change? Which revolutionary
period do you think caused the most change from the
previous condition? Why do you choose that one;
what were those changes?