The Beginning of the Industrial Revolution in America
THE BEGINNING OF THE INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION IN AMERICA A key factor explaining why America industrialized so early and so quickly was the country’s continuing ties with England after the American Revolution. Americans quickly understood the profitable opportunities of the new production methods being created in England. Americans also had access to much of the scientific and technical knowledge being created and applied in England. Ambitious Englishmen with technical knowledge, like Samuel Slater the founder of the American textile industry, came to America because they had more opportunity here to get rich. Americans read English scientific and technical journals; often, American like Robert Fulton went to England to see the new methods and machinery. The future Baltimore and Ohio Railroad sent an engineer over to England to find out about English railroad technology even before England had completed its first general purpose railroad. One reason industrialization spread was the asso