HIST 102 #26 - The First Industrial Revolution

Hello, um, welcome back to our lecture series for Western Civilization 102. We have mostly been focused on the French Revolution and the Napoleonic Empire, and of course, what is happening in Europe after Napoleon is defeated. Now, we'll discuss and learn a little bit about the first Industrial Revolution.

The first Industrial Revolution begins in England, um, and there are a few reasons why. And I'm sure you'll hear more about this as well in just a few minutes, but England's economy was pretty sound. This is around, I guess, the mid-18th century, and you know, people could afford to buy goods, and there was a higher standard of living for workers in England then, of course, on the European continent in places like France, for example. And they had, in England, had an increased food supply and increased population. They had a surplus of capital as well at this time. Also, the English nobility thought that working to get a profit, to earn money, was actually a good thing. They didn't think it was beneath them to actually work and make a living, um. So we're going to see that the overall feeling in England was conducive to to starting this first Industrial Revolution.

England had also bettered their transportation systems throughout the country, which definitely helps with getting goods, you know, to and from market, basically helping trade on England as well. And England did not have tariffs or those taxes on on goods that European countries had that would hinder trade. Say if you were France and you had a tariff and you had goods coming in from Germany, that would basically, you know, hinder or hurt trade there, um. And of course, England had, they had an awesome Navy. So they, they had a really good maritime tradition, and so they had lots of ships to transport these goods as well. And they also had a lot of mineral resources, coal and iron ore, that was needed in the manufacturing process for these factories.

So, you know, we're going to see different industries as far as we have cotton, of course, different inventions that will help increase this output with the cotton industry. We have the steam engine, which will help make the Industrial Revolution a success. And there were inventions that helped, for example, in the mining of coal. They could go deeper and deeper into the ground, the steam engine, of course, helping that out, pumping water out three times quicker than before. Railroads are being built in England, of course, but also Europe. Europe's the continent's just a little bit behind, but they'll, they'll come about, they'll come into the industrial revolution as well, um. But we have railroads as far as transportation is concerned. The first modern railways were in England, which will help with the Industrial Revolution. And bridges are being constructed, textile factories also, you know, eventually the Industrial Revolution spreads onto the European continent.

The reason it was delayed, there were a few reasons why it takes a bit longer for the Industrial Revolution to hit the continent. Transportation systems were not good. They, they didn't have really great transportation systems in France and Germany, for example. France didn't have as, as many navigable rivers as England did, for example. And again, I'd mentioned those tariffs. England, Europe had a lot of tariffs, a lot of separate tariffs that will hinder trade. And they didn't have as many of the raw materials, the specific ones that were helpful for the Industrial Revolution, like England did, such as coal. Now, especially, uh, the middle class people on the European continent were maybe not as motivated to make money, start businesses, or in large businesses. It was more agrarian, which is agriculture, on the continent. And so we're not going to see as much capital being loaned out and, and such on the European continent. And, you know, the French Revolution and all of the Napoleonic Wars that had taken place had destroyed a lot of factories and machinery. And Napoleon's Continental System had also hurt Europe economically as well. And at that, you know, when Napoleon did his Continental System, England just simply found other markets to trade. So there's a lot of reasons why the Industrial Revolution is delayed.

And I also have to say, for example, with the different inventions and machines that are, are being built in England, spinning jenny, that kind of steam engine, all that, England was very, um, they wanted to try and keep these inventions to themselves. They actually had laws saying that if you worked in a factory, that you couldn't leave the country because they didn't want all of this knowledge to get out. It does, however, eventually this will reach the United States as well. And we gained some of that British technology through spying, of course, because the British didn't just simply hand it over and wish as well. But we're going to notice eventually, I don't know, around 1815 or so, 1815 or so, that population is increasing. We're having more producers and consumers on the European continent. Governments are becoming more centralized, so the state could actually sponsor, give money to industries, or could help build railroads, which would improve their transportation system, or maybe award grants to entrepreneurs or inventors. So they start doing like these protective tariffs, basically trying to keep English goods out of their countries and protect their own businesses within their countries. Got a protective tariff. So eventually the Industrial Revolution spreads.

So what we, we see is before we had a, a kind of a home-based craft economy, and then with the, the beginnings of the Industrial Revolution starting in England, eventually spreading to Europe and to the United States, we're going to see that people are coming out of their homes, they're actually working in factories, and, um, it's much more structured, which will cause actually a lot of, of issues, of course, and a lot of very poor working conditions as well. So let's find out more about the first Industrial Revolution.

Hello, today we are going to talk about the first Industrial Revolution, and in order to do that, we also want to discuss a little bit about its impact on society. And a lot of people don't realize that the Industrial Revolution actually started in England. So let's, uh, let's take a look at this and, uh, and we're going to tell you a little bit about it and how it started in England, and how it spread to Europe, and finally how it spread to the United States and eventually to other parts of the world. But we're not going to be discussing that. The Industrial Revolution was one of the most transforming events in history, and it started in England, like I said, and then it spread to other places. But the question is, why? Why did it start in England? Well, I'm about to give you a list of reasons why the Industrial Revolution started in England.

First of all, we had what was known as the Agricultural Revolution. And with this Agricultural Revolution, we have significant advances made in the area of farming. So we're not going to get into all of the advances that were made in farming during this period, but we're just going to kind of say that we have new crops, we have new methods of rotating crops, we have fertilization techniques, we have breeding of animals, and one, we also have a number of new inventions. And among those new inventions is something known as the seed drill, making it easier for planting. And that was attributed to a man named Jethro Tull. The seed drill, which helped in all of these things, helped to produce more crops, and England is going to have more food and more purchasing power. So we, so we have reasons why the Industrial Revolution started in England, and reason number one being the Agricultural Revolution and all these advances in the field of farming.

Another reason why the Industrial Revolution started in England was that they already had what we would call a ready supply of capital. In other words, you had people who could afford to invest in new technologies for factories and so on. So you have a ready supply of capital. And another reason why the Industrial Revolution starts in England is because you have a few individuals, we like to say, we like to call them entrepreneurs, who are very interested in making money. They're very interested in making profits. So they're, they're willing to take chances, they're willing to invest, they're willing to to put their money out there so that they can make money. They, they, they, they see these opportunities that they not only will see the opportunities, they will seize the opportunities to make money. So we have that, uh, individuals who are interested in making profits, these early industrial entrepreneurs, as we will call them.

Another reason why Britain was able to, shall we say, uh, get in first on the Industrial Revolution was because they had an ample supply of resources. They had mineral resources such as iron and coal, and those resources are going to be very important when it comes to industry, as you will soon see. Plus, we have to add another reason why England is number one, or we say Britain is is number one, why the Industrial Revolution starts in England is because the government is going to be playing a major role. The government will play a major role to pass laws that will actually protect private property, and, and this, of course, will help be an incentive for, um, for industry. So you have the government because you have the government supporting it. And of course, we'll talk more about the government and making laws having to do with industry later on.

Uh, we, we want to now talk about some of the technological changes that happen that will help get this Industrial Revolution kicked off. So first, we talked about reasons why it started in England, and now we're going to talk about some of the technological changes. Now, I'm not talking about something related to farming. We discussed the Agricultural Revolution separately. This is technological changes that will push us in, push us, meaning England, into the industrial revolution. And these changes have to do with the cotton industry. Before, before the Industrial Revolution, people would, uh, make cotton cloth in their homes. This was that, it was known as like a cottage industry, which, uh, definitely is, was very different from, from what we're going to talk about. So, and it would take a long time to spin thread, it would take a long time to to weave the cloth and so on. But these, uh, these, these, uh, inventions that I'm about to talk about, uh, will, will show you how things will get faster and faster over time. Uh, these machines that they will create to help spin cloth, to help spin thread, and, and then weave cloth, it's going to definitely pick up, and things will get faster and bigger, and, and pretty soon you'll have these factories, and we'll talk about that in a moment.

It's 1733. We have a man named John Kay who invents what's known as the flying shuttle. And with this flying shuttle, we have a weaving machine that actually allowed one man to do as much as two, or woman, if you will, to do as much as two. So that in and of itself, at that time, was something that was, uh, considered significant. But this led to more inventions, more inventions when it came to spinning thread and weaving cloth. For example, in 1764, we have a man named John Hargreaves who comes out with something called the spinning jenny. The spinning jenny, with this invention, one person could spin thread, or as much thread as eight people. So that is a significant achievement. Then just, uh, or closely around the same time, we have a man named Richard Arkwright who comes up with what's called a water frame weaving machine. And that sounds kind of strange, a water frame weaving machine. Hmm, I wonder if it, if they used water power. Well, of course, that's what we mean. We mean a weaving machine that uses water power. Oh, so these first cotton mills would have to be built by water or on, on rivers. So that, that's interesting.

1779. We have a man named Samuel Crompton. Samuel Crompton was able to come out with what's called a spinning mule. So first we had the spinning jenny, now we have the spinning mule. And the spinning mule did weaving and spinning, and it did it much faster. So with these new inventions, things are getting faster and faster. 1789. We have a man called Edmund Cartwright who comes out with what we call a power loom. A power loom, which does things even faster. And then, of course, way over across the ocean in the United States, now this is going to be connected to this Industrial Revolution in England, but we have a man called Eli Whitney who invents the cotton gin. Which means more people are going to plant cotton because with the cotton gin, you have a device that separates the seeds from the cotton fiber without people having to pick it out by hand, which took a long, long time. So this, this new invention called the cotton gin is going to help this cotton industry in England.

Anyway, so Richard Arkwright, we met him a few moments ago. Richard Arkwright gets the credit for opening the first textile mill. And of course, he does this back in 1774. He opens the first textile mill, and within a few years, you had a number of these cotton mills in England. These cotton mills that were, that's what we call them, that were driven by water power, okay? You have towns, you have cities that begin springing up around these cotton mills, and you have other related inventions that help with any problems they encounter, and other inventions that will actually feed into new industries.

So now we need to talk about something that will be connected to many industries, and it's something known as the steam engine. The steam engine. So a man named Thomas Newcomen came out with, or invented, you could say, a steam engine. And this was like in the early part of the 1700s that this man called Newcomen had come out with a steam engine. So we often like to give him, Thomas Newcomen, the credit for inventing the steam engine. But the reason that the steam engine was invented in the first place was to help pump water out of the coal mines in England. That was a big problem, trying to get the water out of the coal mines. And at first, it was known simply as, as an atmospheric engine. I know that sounds like a strange thing to us, an atmospheric engine. And then they eventually started calling them steam engines. And then, uh, a few decades later, we have a man named James Watt. And we also have some other people who get involved with inventing bigger and better steam engines, but the name James Watt really stands out. So he invents what we call a bigger and better steam engine that could pump the water from the coal mines three times faster than other steam engines. So we have improvements being made with these steam engines. So they're getting faster. And now we also see where steam power is being applied to manufacturing. That's right. Many of the mills started using steam power for the manufacturing instead of the water power. They started using these steam engines, and this is something that helped to speed up industry even more. So things seem to be getting bigger and faster and able to do more and, and, and, and, and the whole process seems to, seems to just snowball. It seems to snowball.

Steam power becomes the main source of energy in the late 19th century, or to, or rather, till the late 19th century, it will become the main source of power, the main source of energy until the end of the 19th century. And then later on, there will be what we call a Second Industrial Revolution that you'll hear about in another lecture. But steam power becomes numero uno, becomes number one during this time. And, and you might say, well, steam power, whoa, how did that work? Well, I don't know exactly how it worked, not a scientist, but the, the steam was fueled by coal. That's interesting. The steam engines were fueled by coal. So the coal industry grew even more. The coal industry grew tremendously. So we have these different industries being connected to one another. And, and listen to this, the steam engine revolutionized the production of cotton goods and allowed the factory system to spread to other areas, not just in England, but to other countries. That you didn't have to set up your mill on a river anymore. You didn't have to set it up on water. You didn't have to use the, the, the, the, the, the, the water power. Now you could use the steam power.

Not only that, not only did the, uh, the steam revolutionize the the, uh, cotton mill industry and, and, uh, industrial, uh, industrialization period, but also we, we see, uh, new industries being created. New industries being created. For example, we have the, the iron industry, uh, in, in Britain that, uh, that is going to get stronger because of new processes, which I'll explain in a moment. But this iron industry is going to be connected to another industry. It's in that we'll talk about trains in a moment. But anyway, the iron industry of Britain was, uh, radically transformed during this time. So we're not saying they didn't have an iron industry at all before this, but what we're saying is it is radically transformed during this period because we have a new method of making iron. We have a new method of what they call smelting the iron ore in order to produce cast iron. And this new method was known as, uh, as puddling. I know it sounds strange. So this system called puddling was developed, and, and with this puddling, you had better iron. You had a higher grade, a higher quality of iron. And this, of course, this, of course, is going to cause what we would say a, a boom in the iron industry because you can make better iron, the quality is better, it's the iron is going to be in bigger demand, and they're going to be wanting iron to use, uh, for, uh, for the factories. They're going to be wanting iron to, uh, to use, uh, in, in other industries, as we'll talk about in a moment. So here we say again, this caused the boom in the iron industry, and the demand for new machines in factories helped the development of the iron industry. So it was like these industries were dependent on one another, and they're helping each other grow. These industries are helping each other grow.

Not only that, they are connected to new industries. New industries will be created. Wow, this is just, and, and we're only scratching the surface here. We're just scratching the surface of, of some of the stuff that happened, uh, in England during the Industrial Revolution. So now we want to connect all of this to maybe not all of it, but we want to definitely connect the iron industry to a revolution in transportation. A revolution in transportation. Well, what exactly do we mean by that? We're going to have a revolution in what we call the railroad industry. That's right. England had some railroads at first, railroads that were, uh, that, that used a horse-drawn carts, for example, little rails coming out of, out of the mines to carry the, the coal and that sort of thing. But in 1804, steam power was combined with the railroad. Now they're going to be using steam for the railroad. They're not going to be pulling carts with, with the horses. They're going to be having these big steam-driven, steam-powered engines now. And of course, by 1820, England is going to have several hundred miles of railroad track. And by 1850, they're going to have several thousand miles of railroad track. And you know what? They're not just going to be carrying goods. They're not just going to be carrying products. They're not just going to be carrying raw materials on these rail cars. They are also going to be carrying people. So the railroad becomes an industry in itself, and it's all connected to the iron industry and the coal industry. Things are so interconnected, and we just don't realize it.

So now when they're transporting their raw materials, they're transporting their goods, they're transporting their people, then they can do this much faster, much faster with the rail cars, much faster. And it's, it's, it's also very exciting. So the growth of the rail industry caused the coal and the iron industries to grow even further. Yeah, because, hey, they're using steam power on the railroad, so they need coal to run the steam engines. So, and, and then they need, they need iron to make the engines and to, uh, make the, uh, the rails. So it's all, all seems to be interconnected, and they're creating new jobs. Wow, it's amazing. It's absolutely amazing.

So this Industrial Revolution that we've talked about, or at least how it got started in England, is not going to be confined to England. It is going to spread. It's going to spread to other areas. It's going to spread, for example, to Europe. Oh, that's right. It is going to spread to Europe. It's going to spread to the United States. Let's talk about in Europe for a few moments. Let's, let's hit a few, a few highlights as to where it spreads in Europe. For example, it, it goes into France, it goes into Belgium, it goes into what we call some of the German states at this time. We don't, we don't have a unified Germany quite yet, but we will by the end of the 19th century. But anyway, so, um, places like France and, and Belgium, and parts of, of what we would eventually call Germany, is going to be the first to industrialize on the continent of Europe. And, um, and they're going to start doing cotton manufacturing as well, you know, like, like the, the cotton manufacturing in England. So by the time we get to 1850, you can to have large industrial centers in places like I mentioned, in places like France and, and Belgium, and, uh, and of course, parts of Northern Germany. And we're talking particularly in those areas where they had resources, they had mineral resources that they could use in their industry, like iron ore and, and coal, for example. So other places too, like in Northern Italy, and of course, the United States, they are going to be industrializing as well.

And I'd like to say just a little bit about the Industrial Revolution in the United States. For example, the United States has its own Industrial Revolution, and the United States is going to have tremendous growth. We're talking about, um, the cities in the North, in the northern part of the United States, mostly. And that's where we're going to have most of the factories, a huge, huge percentage of the factories. So we're going to have some, uh, factories and some industrialized areas in the Northeast of the U.S. But a lot of, a lot of Europe at this time, and of course, the southern part of the United States is going to remain very much untouched by the Industrial Revolution because in some areas you're going to have a lack of natural resources, and in other areas you're going to have, uh, other things that are lacking. So it will make it more difficult for the Industrial Revolution to go to other areas. But here in the United States, we like to give a man named Samuel Slater a lot of credit because he is often referred to as the father of the American Industrial Revolution because he gets credit for, for, for copying and bringing stuff from England to the United States. So that's Samuel Slater, so-called father of the American Industrial Revolution.

But, um, speaking of America, speaking of the United States, I'd like to mention a few other things about this, um, this Industrial Revolution that happens here in the United States. Of course, besides the fact that I mentioned Eli Whitney and the cotton gin, I also want to mention that in 1807, in the United States, we have a man named Robert Fulton who is able to have the first successful steamboat. Now, I'm not saying that he was the only one that came up with that idea, but he's the one that gets the credit for having the first truly successful steamboat, and that was right here in the United States. And then by 1850, there would be transatlantic steamships. So, oh my goodness, not only are we using steam power for the railroads, we are using it for shipping now. And again, steam is the main power that is used until the latter part of the 19th century.

But also another thing about the United States, I'd like to point out was that a man named Samuel Morse will come out with, or invent, what we call a telegraph. And many of us have heard of the Morse code. Well, it was Samuel Morse that came out with the Morse code, and of course, he invented the telegraph. So here in the United States, we have, we have someone who invented the telegraph, and then eventually we're going to have someone who invents the telephone, which would be a little bit later on in, in the 19th century, and a man named Bell. But getting back to this telegraph thing, this was just absolutely phenomenal for, for that day and time. By the time we get to the middle of the 19th century, by the time we get to say 1851, we have a transatlantic telegraph cable that is laid between Great Britain and the United States. We're able to transfer news quickly. I mean, it was just absolutely phenomenal. And then they started doing these, this telegraph, uh, uh, cable laying, telegraph cables, uh, all over Europe. And we had, we were able to have fast news, we were able to have cheap news. And now this, of course, doesn't sound like something very impressive to us in our day and time with our instant messaging and, and all kinds of things that we have. But back then, this was considered absolutely phenomenal. So we, we have a news industry that's created, uh, what, uh, some would call a, a well-developed press came along. And a man named Julius Reuters gets credit for having a news service that would transfer news from Europe to the, to the United States. And so there are so many things that are interconnected here, different inventions, all kind of tied in to this Industrial Revolution and how our lives are, are changing, and things are speeding up. And education is becoming more important. Education is becoming more important. Anyway, so there is just, uh, so, so, so much to talk about. But we want to focus on, uh, certain things about this Industrial Revolution, get back to talking about the Industrial Revolution itself, about the lives of the factory workers and the lives of the, the, what we might call the middle class during this time. We want to discuss a little bit of that for a while.

So we, we have benefits of the Industrial Revolution, and we also have burdens of the Industrial Revolution. We have positive things, and we have negative things. First of all, let's talk about a few, some positive things. There'll be some negative things intertwined in there, but on a positive note, at least for some people, we have what we call new wealth. Some new wealth in Britain. Britain's wealth increases dramatically during this Industrial Revolution. For example, the wealth of Britain increased more than threefold between 1780 and 1850. That's, that's very interesting. Their national product increased more than threefold between those years, 1780 and 1750. Not only that, the population expands. We have population expansion in England, we have population expansion in Europe. And, and this gives you an example here, from 175 million in 1780 to 266 million in 1850. But Britain itself, Britain's population more than doubled during this time period with the Agricultural Revolution that could produce more food, and, and that helped dramatically.

The middle class, we have, we have new wealth. New wealth in England. The middle class, uh, is grows. Uh, they, uh, there was new wealth in England that was generated so rapidly that personal income actually rose faster than the population growth. I mean, it's just unbelievable. And, and who is making all this money? Well, it's the, it's the, uh, um, the owners of the factories, the owners of the mines, the owners of these industries. These are the people that are making money. Excuse me for using a, a, an expression, hand over fist. They're just, they're just making lots of money. And some of these people made huge fortunes. I mean, some of these people became phenomenally wealthy. But as a whole, as a whole, the middle class benefited the most from this Industrial Revolution. Initially, the middle class, they benefited the most. We have for the middle class, we have things like the family vacation that comes about during this time. The middle class had separate living districts. They didn't want to live by the factories, of course. They were away from the factories, they were away from the smoke. They lived in separate neighborhoods. And then we have what we call middle class values. Queen Victoria was a queen of England who, who reigned from, from, oh, for a long period, from like 1837 until 1901. She was Queen of England. And so we named a whole time period after the, the Victorian age, and that's tied into this middle class value thing with, with Queen Victoria. So we have this urban middle class who, um, who want to live up to to these, quote, Victorian values. Um, Queen Victoria was a model for morality. We like to say. I wouldn't mind saying a few more things about Queen Victoria, but nonetheless, the Victorian era represented the height of the Industrial Revolution. And we see significant social progress, we see economic progress, we see technological progress in, in England.

Getting back to this middle class moral value thing, we see women of the middle class being what we would call put on a pedestal. They were, they were viewed as, as obedient wives who would wait on their husbands, non-passionate women who might, might get involved in charities, and, and when their husbands would come home, they would, uh, bring him his slippers, his pipe, you know, that sort of, uh, sort of, um, Victorian type of image that some of us get that has lasted, uh, well into the 20th century for some people, expecting the women, women to be submissive and, and waiting on husbands and being non-passionate and that sort of thing. Queen Victoria is also associated with furniture and architecture of the, the period, by the way. Like I said, I want to say a few more things about, about Queen Victoria, and I'll, I'll try to do that very quickly. That her husband had died, and, and she, she wore black the rest of her life. And so she was, she didn't seem like a very happy person. So it's kind of interesting that people wanted to, uh, model their lives after her morality, but nonetheless, I won't go there.

So we have a tremendous growth in, in population, and, um, this is difficult for some of the governments. For example, in England, it's hard for the government to handle the massive movement of people to the cities. It caught the cities unprepared. And, oh my goodness, because of industrialization, the cities are growing so quickly that, uh, that there's so many people moving into the cities that the governments cannot keep up with it. You can't keep up with the growth. You have, you have slums, you have crime problems, you have city streets that are used as open sewers and open drains, problems bringing in fresh water. Oh my goodness, you would not want to see a city or be in a city like this if you think some of the, that there are funny smells on, uh, in the French Quarter on Bourbon Street. Hey, that's nothing compared to what these cities were like back then. Oh man, this overcrowding, terrible living conditions, and, and, and, and, and we have our health problems. We have, we have cholera, we have tuberculosis, uh, people breathing in the factory smoke because they're living right near the factories. Oh my goodness. But we still had population growth, even though we're having these problems that we have to deal with. We, we have a decline in death rates from major diseases, of all things. We have what we call the smallpox vaccine that comes out. A man named Jenner comes out with a smallpox vaccine. And it's interesting because if you hear the story about how he, he noticed, this is a country doctor, Edward Jenner. He, he noticed that the milkmaids did not get smallpox. And so he was able to figure out how to make a vaccine based on, on his observations of the milkmaids not getting smallpox. If they, they did get a, a little bit of something, but it wasn't anything major. And he was able to use this to, and I don't want to get technical with the, uh, with the, the story about that, but let's just say Jenner came out with a smallpox vaccine to help prevent people from getting smallpox and dying from it.

Eventually, we do have, uh, we do have some sanitary conditions during that are improving. Uh, we start making changes in the cities, but some of that's going to take some time. And, um, we have more food because of the Industrial Revolution. Some of this stuff I've already talked about. But even though we have more food, we are going to have a very serious problem. And the only place where we're not going to have population growth is going to be Ireland. Because in Ireland, in 1845, we have what is known as the Potato Famine, a blight that hits the potato crop. And the poor people depended on the potato as their main source of food. So this is going to cause Ireland to actually lose population, not just from people dying, but you're going to have more than, more than a million Irish who are going to leave their country and move to America. So that's, that's kind of interesting that Ireland was the only country that faced a population decline in the 19th century. Um, in other parts of Europe, we see where serfdom is being abolished, we see transportation improving, and that sort of thing.

But before we finalize our material on the Industrial Revolution, I'd like to talk a little bit about the working conditions for the, the factory workers and a little bit about people working in the mines. I'm talking about the working conditions, conditions of factory workers and the mine workers. We are talking something very horrendous here. We are talking very dangerous, very deplorable working conditions. We're talking 12 to 16 hour days and six days a week. We're talking no minimum wage. This is when the Industrial Revolution starts out. I mean, people are literally working their lives away. The mills were dirty, the mills were dusty, the mills were unhealthy. We could go on and on. No safety equipment. If you injured yourself too bad, because if they didn't have workman's comp, they didn't have anything to, to, to, to help the people. So no safety equipment, and very little, very, very little time off for breaks. And the wages were very low. Oh my goodness. So no unemployment, no minimum wage, no disability compensation. The list goes on and on.

But you might be shocked to hear what else I have to say. Women and children were working. We are talking women and children in large numbers were working. And you might say, well, what's wrong with people doing a little bit of work? Well, these were, these are virtual horror stories about particularly with the children. Women were working in factories and mines. Children were working in factories and mines. Children were exploited. Oh, because they were small, they could, they could do the mine work easier and get in these little nooks and crannies because they were smaller. They could maneuver around the machines and try to unclog some of these factory machines that might get jammed up. And, oh, don't you talk about dangerous. So the children were exploited during this time. Children had a terrible life. If they were, oh, you had families whose children would be working. You had poor orphans who would be sent off to, to do this mill and mine work. So, oh, it was terrible. And five years old, this is before they started doing the, the regulations on this sort of thing. Five years old, they would be working in factories. Oh my goodness. And children could be paid way less. The children would receive a third or less than that, a third of the pay that a man would get, or probably less than a third. Women were paid about half of what a man would get. So women and children were being exploited during this time. And again, no safety regulations. And, um, they made, they made changes. Change came slowly. Change came slowly.

For example, we have efforts that change by the time we get to the 1830s and the 1840s. We have in England, we have Parliament enacting laws, laws to get rid of the worst kinds of abuse in the workforce. We're talking the first law is mainly affected children in the, in the textile mills and in the mines. And then, well, for example, we have the Factory Act of 1833. That's it. That's one example. The Factory Act of 1833 stated that the children between 9 and 13 could work only eight hours a day. Can you imagine your nine-year-old working, period, working a job, particularly in a mine or a factory, for eight hours a day? Those between 14 and 18 could only work a maximum of 12 hours a day. 12 hours into work and 12 hours a day. Wow. Of course, I know there's people that work, do 12-hour shifts for different jobs even now, but back then it was different. The Factory Act of 1844 included women. Factory Act of 1844 stated that women could only work 12 hours a day. In 1842, women and children, women and children under 10 would no longer have to work in mines. So women and children under 10 would no longer work in mines.

So gradually we see changes being made. And then by 1856, we have the hours of work for those 9 to 11, excuse me, 9 to 18, the number of hours would be reduced down to 10 hours rather than 12 hours a day. Now it's going to be 10 hours a day. So we have these, these different factory acts, and, and sometimes they kind of go, they take a step forward, and they take a step backward as far as the laws in England regarding the, the, the working of the children in, in, in, in the mines, well, in the factories, and, and women, and they, they kind of, they waver back and forth just a little bit. But by 1878, here we have it. By 1878, we have what's known as the Factory Act of 1878. There were a lot of factory acts, and you shouldn't have to remember all of them because it would get rather confusing. But the Factory Act of 1878, I want to kind of emphasize that one because here we go. No child anywhere under the age of 10 was to be employed, period, according to this law. And here's something interesting too. We also have included in this compulsory education. A few minutes ago, I kind of breezed over the fact that education is becoming important in the 19th century. So compulsory education for children up to 10 years old. So we're going to want them to have at least an elementary education, at least to learn how to read and write.

Another thing that goes with the Factory Act of 1878: 10 to 14 year olds could only be employed for half days. That's better. Women were to work no more than 56 hours a week. So again, with the factory act, we have no child under the age of 10 was to be employed, period, compulsory education for children up to 10. 10 to 14 year olds only to be employed for half days, and women were not to work more than 56 hours a week. And we also had factory inspectors who were appointed to find those, the find those factory, uh, owners that would break the laws. These guys, these, these inspectors were supposed to go after the, the factory owners that didn't want to follow the laws as they were laid down. So as we can see, the, the progress was slow. Safety in the workplace, that was only partly addressed by this time. They're still going to be more and more improvements needed over time. But like I said, these factory acts, they are, they're the first of them will be taking care of the, the worst abuses in the workplace, and then slowly we were taking a step forward and some backward. And finally, we get, like I said, to the Factory Act of 1878. But, but we must remember that we still have not completely addressed the problem of safety in the workplace. We still don't have workman's compensation, and we still don't have a lot of other things that will be needed to help protect the work, the safety of the workers.

So it sounds like we're talking about all kind of horrible things, and, and, oh my goodness, some of us when we think about this, we, we think of, uh, the story of, of Oliver Twist. And, yeah, it, it would make you, make you think of that. And some of you may have seen the movie or, or read the book. But, um, despite all of these, uh, problems, you know, you have good things, you have bad things happening. But despite all of these, these, uh, problems with the factories, uh, and the workers, we still have the standard of living that does increase. The standard of living does increase eventually for, for everyone, not at first for the working class, but in the long run, the standard of living for everyone does increase. And this is a very debatable, very debatable topic, very debatable issue. But, uh, for some people, the standard of living improved very quickly. For others, it improved very close, slowly. For example, the middle class, of course, their standard of living boom is going to, is going to improve very quickly. And the middle class really took off during this time. We, we have not addressed the, uh, the, uh, other people in the middle class, like the shopkeepers, the law, doctors, the lawyers, the shop owners, what we would call white collar workers, bankers. I mean, these people, these people really, they really took off during the Industrial Revolution, these other middle class. But the standard of living for all does, in the long run, increase. But there's no doubt, there's no doubt that the people who gained in the early part of the Industrial Revolution was the middle class. The industrial workers would have to wait until later, until the second half of the 19th century to benefit from the Industrial Revolution.

So that's just a little bit about the Industrial Revolution, or the first Industrial Revolution, in a nutshell. It starts in England, and then it spreads to some parts of Europe, and then to America. And we have good things that go along with it, we have bad things. But as I said, in the long run, the standard of living does increase, uh, for everyone. But for the factory workers, not immediately. And then, of course, we're going to have new inventions that that are going to speed things up. And as we move over, uh, into the 20th century, uh, steam will be, the steam power will be replaced by oil, and you'll find out about that when you hear about the Second Industrial Revolution. Thank you.

Okay, so we've learned a lot about the first Industrial Revolution. Um, and, you know, it's very sad about, you know, the working conditions here, and not only in Europe, of course, but in the United States. We're going to have a lot of, of reform measures that will eventually slowly come about to try and protect some of these workers because we are moving, like you saw, out of the home into the factories. When we come back for our next lecture, we are going back into revolutions. Yes, Europe is going to experience quite a few revolutions. Yeah, we just left the French Revolution and the Napoleonic Wars, but it's not over. We have a lot of revolutions in the 1820s, 1830s, and the very, very famous revolutionary year of 1848 and '49. Until next time.