The early phases of the Industrial Revolution were dominated by developments in the textile industry, and America soon began to concentrate its energies in that field. Numerous flowing streams and rivers in New England provided the power necessary to run spinning machinery. English emigrant Samuel Slater left England with plans for Richard Arkwright's spinning frame that could produce stronger threads for yarns in his head (it was illegal to export written plans.) He also developed water-powered machinery for spinning and carding cotton. Slater built a mill on the Blackstone River in Rhode Island, and the New England textile industry began to move forward at a rapid pace.
In the 1820s Boston investors began to create a textile manufacturing center in Lowell, Massachusetts. The factories recruited women to operate the machines. The "mill girls," as
They were known, became a feature of the textile industry. The mill girls lived in dormitories far from home and worked long hours at their machines. Although the female factory worker had been near the lowest end of the social spectrum in Europe, the American mill girls, whose labor turned out to be extremely valuable, received somewhat better treatment.
The age of the mill girls ranged from very young pre-teens to older women, but most were between the ages of 16 and 25. As there were few professions available to women outside the home at that time, jobs in the mills were relatively attractive. The Lowell system, as it became known, although it required long hours of work for modest pay, did offer the mill girls opportunities for education and recreation, and female overseers saw to it that girls attended religious services and avoided earthly temptations. Nevertheless, as competition within the industry became sharper, the benevolent treatment began to give way to harsher conditions, and wages dropped. In the 1830s some of the mill workers attempted to strike, but without significant success.
It is interesting that two of the most famous strikes in American history were begun or supported by women in the mill towns of New England. The famous Lawrence strike of 1912 echoed the first mill workers' strike in 1836.
World History
