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The Role of Women in the Industrial Revolution

The first half of the 19th century was a time of great change. Industrialization brought new opportunities for employment, changing ideas of work, and economic cycles of boom and bust. During this period, women's roles changed dramatically. Industrialization redefined the role of women in the home, at the same time opening new opportunities for them as industrial wage earners.

Pre-Industrial America and Women's Worth

In pre-industrial America, the household was the center of production. Most families lived on farms where everyone worked to produce goods in order to survive. Within this context, the status of men and women was relatively equal. Men were the heads of households, but the role of women as caretakers and producers of goods, such as food and clothing, was equally important. With the first stages of industrialization, these patterns changed.

Increasingly, men began working outside of the home. Rather than selling goods they had produced, these workers sold their time to factory owners, who, in turn, sold the mass-produced goods. Men dominated this new realm of work. They made money - not goods - to provide for the family. Material success − how much money one could make and what they could buy with it − became a measure of a person's worth.

Industrial Capitalism and the Changing Role of Women

Women were not paid for work in the home. With the availability of manufactured goods, a woman's role as producer within the home was reduced. The household, and the women who made it a home, took on new meaning. The new role of women was to transform the home into a haven for the men who faced daily pressures and dangers in the work place.

At the same time, women were morally responsible for raising dutiful children, preferably sons. By the mid-19th century, popular media depicted the "True Woman" as one who could competently manage a household, tend to the needs of husband and children, and create a pleasant and morally pure environment.

Farming in the Age of Factories

As the popularity of factory work grew, many questioned the wisdom of moving away from the land. Those who remained in agriculture were forced to concentrate on livestock or cash crops that could be sold to national markets. By the 1840s, cash crops from farms west of Albany dominated the market. Small New England farms were devastated. Large families, failed crops, and little cash income threatened family stability. Such factors may have influenced many women's decisions to go to Lowell. Their departure meant one fewer mouth to feed, and the potential of supporting the family with cash wages.

Lowell, Massachusetts: The Experiment on the Merrimack

The idea of a city like Lowell began with a wealthy Boston merchant, Francis Cabot Lowell. In 1812, Lowell returned from England with the design for a power loom firmly etched in his mind. A year later, he and mechanic Paul Moody built a working power loom. These looms wove cotton threads into cloth, creating a marketplace of machine-produced goods and offering consumers the ease of purchasing something that had previously been a time-consuming, by-hand process.

Lowell envisioned an entire community involved in textile production. With the help of a group of investors, he built a textile mill on the Charles River in Waltham, Massachusetts. By 1817, the factory was an economic success, and the investors began looking to expand beyond the limited power of the Charles River. Lowell died that year, but his colleagues forged ahead. They found the ideal site at the Pawtucket Falls, where the Merrimack River drops more than 30 feet.

In 1821, the investors purchased farmland around the falls, and the first mills opened in 1823. During the next 25 years, they built additional mills and an intricate system of canals that supplied water power to the mills. By 1843, Lowell was the largest industrial center in the United States.

Women at Work: Lowell's Early Labor

The city's investors hired corporate recruiters to enlist young women from rural New England to work in the mills. Their reasoning was two-fold: women were apt to stay in the city only a few years before leaving to become wives and mothers, thus preventing the establishment of a permanent working class; and women were less expensive and more easily controlled than men.

Every woman had her own reasons for seeking factory work. Life was very difficult on a subsistence farm in New England − large families resulting in minimal (if any)  inheritances, failing crops from unpredictable weather, and young men leaving in search of a better life (reducing marriage prospects).

One can only imagine how these "country girls" felt as they made their way into the city. In that instant, they saw what the majority of people in their hometown had never seen: massive brick factories; rows of streets lined with shops, taverns, and boardinghouses; crowds of well-dressed young people; and a mind-altering noise of the mills.

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The Role of Women in the Industrial Revolution | Tsongas Industrial History Center | UMass Lowell (uml.edu)