Page 86 - Copshaholm Curriculum Book_2015

Horrors of the
Workplace

The Revolution Comes to
America

When the Industrial Revolution came to the United States, several swore not to copy the
English who had a permanent underclass living in wretched conditions. Francis Cabot
Lowell tried to set the stage in Massachusetts. Lowell built a factory that spun cotton
into thread and wove it into cloth by machine. He was as much concerned with the well
being of his workers as well as his profits. He was set on not using children and poor
families. He hired young girls from the surrounding farms, housed them in nice
dormitories, built them a church and paid them fairly for the work they did in his mill.
Some of the girls were even able to send money home to help their parents back on the
farm. While the Lowell System of hiring workers did work, it did not catch on.

The beginning of child labor

In Rhode Island, Samuel Slater’s factory opened by hiring 7 boys and 2 girls between
the ages of 7 and 12 to run his spinning machines. They could be hired much cheaper
than men. They received between 33 and 67 cents per week, while adult workers in
Rhode Island were earning between $2 and $3 a week. By 1820 one-half of Rhode
Island’s factory workers were children. As factories and mines spread across the east
coast, owners began hiring more and more children.