182 Wisconsin Academy of Sciences, Arts, and Letters. 
vented by our navigation laws from becoming American vessels 
again. 81 Ship-builders now found their business unprofitable, 
and while many of them struggled on for some time, others 
turned their attention to more profitable fields of enterprise. 
From the blow delivered by the Civil War, our shipping indus¬ 
try has never recovered. 
Having traced the course of some of the more important in¬ 
dustries in Massachusetts during and after the war, let us ex¬ 
amine the following table which compares conditions of certain 
branches of manufacture in 1865 with conditions in 1855. 82 
Cotton 
) Number of establishments.... 
(Yards of cloth manufactured 
Wool 
Number of establishments. 
Lbs. of wool manufactured. 
Yards of broadcloth manufactured 
Sewing- machines. 
j Number of establishments. 
i Sewing machines manufactured. 
Calico 
Number of yards printed 
Bleaching and 
coloring. 
j Number o-' establishments.. 
(Number of hands employed, 
Boots and shoes-.. 
Pairs of boots manufactured 
Paifs of shoes manufactured 
1855 . 
1865. 
294 
214 
314,996,5674 
167,665,369 
146 
218 
18,786,298 
28,790,078 
759,627* 
3,457,702 
8 
9 
4,028 
48,563 
61,040,000 
53,489,434 
11 
5 
644 
447 
11,892,329 
7,249,921 
33,174,409 
24,620,660 
. ... ... . .—.—.— - v 
The manufacture of 
carpets, declined between 1855 and 1865. 
hosiery, improves between 1855 and 1865. 
linen, improves between 1855 and 1865. 
silk, nearly stationary between 1855 and 1865. 
nails, declines between 1855 and 1865. 
pig iron, declines between 1855 and 1865. 
hollow ware and castings, improves between 1855 and 1865. 
scythes, declines between 1855 and 1865. 
cutlery, improves between 1855 and 1865. 
ploughs and other agricultural implements, declines considerably between 185- 
and 1865. 
From this table and the other evidence thus far presented it is. 
clear that many industries, and especially the more important 
ones, 83 were not only retarded in their natural rate of progress 
during these ten years but were not as well off in 1865 as they 
had been ten years before. 
During the twenty years preceding the Crisis of 1857, the 
si Ibid, vol. 1, p. 435. 
82 Constructed from DeWitt, Statistical Information, etc., for 1855, 
and Warner, Ibid, for 1865. 
83 Wool excepted. 
