FACTORY AND FACTORY SYSTEM 2125 FACTORY AND FACTORY SYSTEM 



36 have no common factor except 1. When 

 numbers have no common factors other than 

 1, they are said to be prime to each other. 

 For full discussion of greatest common divisor 



see the article of that name. For full discus- 

 sion of multiples, see LEAST COMMON -MuL- 

 'TIPLE. See, also, for closely-related subjects, 

 FRACTIONS; SQUARE ROOT; CUBE ROOT. A.H. 



. ACTORY AND FACTORY SYSTEM . The 

 word factory suggests great buildings in which 

 hundreds of men, women and perhaps children 

 are engaged in making thousands of articles. 

 The factory is typical of modern industry; it 

 is the application of economic law to the 

 process of production. By division of labor 

 a large number of workmen cooperate to make 

 at a lower cost many times more articles than 

 the same number of workmen could make if 

 each worked separately. Strictly considered, 

 a dozen men, working in the same building 

 and each making a complete pair of shoes a 

 day, would not be workmen in a factory. But 

 their shop would be a factory if these twelve 

 men worked in cooperation, and if each man 

 performed only a few of the processes, with 

 the result that not one dozen pairs but many 

 dozen pairs were finished each day. The 

 essential feature of the factory system is not 

 the number of workmen, or the use of ma- 

 chinery, or the increased output, but it is the 

 division of labor. Any establishment in which 

 a number of persons cooperate by consecutive 

 processes in the production of an article may 

 be called a factory. 



Development of the Factory System. The 

 factory system did not suddenly spring up, 

 fully developed, but it grew by degrees. It 

 arose about the middle of the eighteenth cen- 

 tury, when new inventions were beginning to 

 take the place of hand labor about the time 

 that Arkwright's and Hargreaves* spinning 

 jennies, Cartwright's power loom and other in- 

 ventions revolutionized the manufacture of 

 cotton goods. The introduction of automatic 

 machinery was accompanied by the persecu- 

 tion which all pioneers must face; many in- 

 ventors, a few now famous and many lost in 

 obscurity, spent years in perfecting machines 

 only to have them destroyed by mobs. Some 



people thought that machinery was the work 

 of Satan, and others thought that it would 

 throw all workmen out of employment. 



These two types of opponents could not stop 

 the growth of the factory system, and during 

 the nineteenth century its development, not 

 only in Great Britain and America, but 

 throughout the civilized world, made it pos- 

 sible for the inventor to protect his own in- 

 terests as well as benefit his fellows. The 

 patent system stimulated invention, for the 

 man of ideas could then be sure that his 

 neighbor could not steal his plans without 

 punishment. Inventions were soon recorded in 

 all branches of industry. 



Besides the introduction of automatic ma- 

 chinery and the development of the patent 

 laws, the factory system owes its growth to 

 two factors the use of steam as motive power 

 and the development of transportation facil- 

 ities. At first all machinery was driven by 

 water power. This meant that a factory had 

 to be placed at some spot where there was 

 sufficient water power, regardless of location 

 with reference to the markets or labor sup- 

 ply. When, however, steam power became 

 available, the factory owner could locate his 

 plant wherever the supply of workmen and 

 the demand for his products seemed to make 

 a factory most desirable. 



Even with this restriction on location re- 

 moved, the factory system could not have 

 reached its greatest development with the slow 

 and costly methods of transportation used in 

 the eighteenth century. The use of steam 

 power in manufacturing freed the manufac- 

 turer from the restriction of location, but the 

 application of steam to railroads and ships did 

 more, for wherever he might be, it opened to 

 him the markets of the world. To be sure, 

 nations sometimes restrict markets by impos- 



