Cartwright's power loom

Historical Context Note

Litencyc Editors (Independent Scholar - Europe)

The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 1.2.1.05: English Writing and Culture from the Glorious Revolution to the French Revolution, 1689-1789.
Vol. editors: Paul Baines (University of Liverpool), Daniel Cook (University of Dundee), Pat Rogers (University of South Florida), Nicholas Seager (University of Keele)

Domains

Water power

Dates

Date of occurrence 1785

Places

United Kingdom (Location)

Edmund Cartwright patented the first power loom in 1785. This loom capitalised on the flying shuttle invented in 1733 by John Kay, and improvements in yarn production achieved by Hargreaves ( the “spinning Jenny”, 1764) and Crompton (the “spinning mule”, 1779) and Arkwright’s “water frame” of 1769, which had radically increased the volume and quality of yarns available to weavers. Whilst Cartwright’s first loom was a breakthrough, it was also imperfect, and many more refinements were to be required before the full effect of its achievements could realised. However, through 1800-1810 improvements by other inventors, coupled with improvements in steam engines, brought the power loom to such efficiency that it was …

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129 words

Citation: Editors, Litencyc. "Cartwright's power loom". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 23 January 2004 [https://staging.litencyc.com/php/stopics.php?rec=true&UID=167, accessed 23 November 2024.]

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Cartwright's power loom

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