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The Great Textile Industry And The System

Decent Essays

Q2: The Seen and Unseen Forces of the Great Textile Industry and the System It Encompasses Computers, automobiles, and electricity. All examples of modern technology we experience and interact with every day. However, modern technology is more often than not associated with individual objects rather than the systems they are a part of. This is due to the fact that they are physical and mechanical, easily read and comprehended (Hughes 184). On the contrary, these devices are simply ingredients of the highly complex technological systems they are a part of. The increased use of organized labor and mechanization in the first factory mills in the late 17th century sparked industrialization in the first American factories. These early American …show more content…

It was the first of its kind to introduce organized labor on a grand scale. Additionally, it was the first to incorporate family values into factory work (Hindle 188). Employees of the mill came from the surrounding countryside looking for work; these families consisting of men, women, and children were the visible driving force behind these mills (Hindle 192). The employees were managed and segmented by the unseen force of management. Work force in the mill consisted of mule spinners, hand-loom weavers, dressers, machinists, and supervisors. Even in its early stages, the invisible force of organization and an employee skill system was becoming crucial to the factory system (Pursell 87). Young children worked and were known as ‘piercers’, stitching together pieces of yarn at a quick rate while the more skilled mule spinners used a machine to spin fine yarn (Hindle 190). The success of the mill in Pawtucket created a phenomena felt all over the country. Various ‘mill villages’ sprung up and supported this new economic driver (Hindle 192). Although it set a model for other factories across New England, organizers of other textile mills altered their management system in response to local cost of labor, materials, and local cultural traditions (Pursell 102). These modified systems could be seen in New Hampshire and Massachusetts in the 1820s during difficult times for farmers. With the opening of the Erie canal an ever increasing amount of young males were leaving to

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