MACHINE 



3561 



MACHINE 



The Greek and the Roman patricians in- 

 dulged in a lavish display and a liberal scale of 

 living, but they could hardly have imagined 

 the wealth of the modern world. Compared 

 with London and New York, the cities of the 

 classic world were poor, and the cities of the 

 medieval world were poverty-stricken. The 

 great wealth of the present world is due largely 

 to machines. 



Changes in Production. Before the machine 

 was invented, man had what he could make 

 with his hands. He was often a cunning crafts- 

 man who loved and wrought beautiful articles, 

 but the rate of production was necessarily 

 slow. Surplus wealth did not accumulate. The 

 change in man's material condition dates from 

 1769, the year in which James Watt invented 

 the steam engine. The steam engine was only 

 the first of a series of inventions, which in- 

 cluded the cotton gin, power looms for weav- 

 ing, and steam locomotion on land and sea. 

 Invention has gone steadily on in every depart- 

 ment of life for a century and a half; it has 

 changed the social habits of all civilized peo- 

 ples, and has completely revolutionized in- 

 dustry. 



It has been estimated that the power used 

 in machinery produces twelve times as much 

 as all human labor could produce without it. 

 The natural result has been an enormous in- 

 crease in production, with a consequent cheap- 

 ening of the articles produced. Invention has 

 followed invention. The thirteenth annual re- 

 port of the United States Department of Labor 

 on hand and machine labor listed 672 examples 

 of labor-saving machinery. Only a few of the 

 more important machines can be referred to 

 here. 



The results obtained with the cotton gin are 

 among the most striking. It was invented by 

 Eli Whitney in 1793. By the old hand method, 

 a worker would have spent about two years in 

 turning out a bale of cotton. The machine 

 produces from three to fifteen bales a day. 

 Improved methods resulted in a fall in price 

 of about thirty cents a pound in a little over 

 a century . The introduction of the power loom 

 revolutionized the industrial life of England. 

 Cotton spinning ceased to be a cottage industry 

 and was carried on in factories by hired labor. 

 The old spindle and distaff gave way before 

 the spindle of the modern machine, which can 

 be run at a speed of 11,000 revolutions a min- 

 ute. Steam was first successfully applied to 

 navigation early in the last century. In a 

 hundred years the improvements have been 



amazing. Instead of Fulton's Clermont, we 

 have the Imperator, driven through the water 

 at thirty miles an hour, by Parsons turbine 

 engines rated at 68,000 horse power. Delicate 

 but powerful electrical machines have recently 

 become a serious rival of steam power. 



By no means the least wonderful of the 

 machines perfected in the last century are 

 those used iy printing. The linotype can be 

 made to do the work of about five printers, 

 nor is its mechanism less remarkable than its 

 speed. The huge presses on which the metro- 

 politan papers are printed are capable of turn- 

 ing out 96,000 copies of a sixteen-page paper 

 an hour, counted and folded. 



Effect on Labor. Labor-saving machinery has 

 often been bitterly assailed by the workers 

 whom it has displaced. In England during the 

 transition period, the weavers, reduced to 

 abject poverty, forced to leave their homes 

 in the country and become wageworkers in 

 crowded towns, revolted and smashed the ma- 

 chines. Hundreds became public charges. In 

 general, however, it is believed that the work- 

 ers as a whole do not suffer through the intro- 

 duction of new machines, though it is not 

 denied that certain groups of workers may be 

 subjected to great temporary hardships during 

 periods of adjustment to new conditions. At 

 present the hopes of the workers may be said 

 to be fixed on obtaining a more equitable dis- 

 tribution of the increased riches brought by the 

 machine. See INVENTION. E.D.F. 



Related Subjects. The following list of arti- 

 cles in these volumes contains not only machines 

 and certain important devices connected with ma- 

 chines, but instruments as well : 



Adding Machine 



Air Brake 



Air Compressor 



Air Engine 



Air Pump 



Archimedean Screw 



Balance 



Barker's Mill 



Barometer 



Bell 



Bellows 



Belt 



Block and Tackle 



Blowing Machines 



Blowpipe 



Boiler 



Boring Machines 



Calculating Machines 



Cam 



Camera 



Camera Lucida 



Camera Obscura 



Carburetor 



Cash Register 



Chronometer 



Clock 



Compass 



Cotton Gin 



Crane 



Diagonal Scale 



Dictograph 



Die 



Dipping Needle 



Dynamo 



Electric Bell 



Electric Machine 



Electric Motor 



Engine 



Field Glass 



Filter 



Flying Machine 



Galvanometer 



Gas Engine 



Gauge 



Governor 



Gyroscope 



Hectograph 



Heliograph 



