The Industrial Revolution

The Industrial Revolution, which took place in Great Britain between the middle of the eighteenth century and the middle of the nineteenth, transformed British industry and society and made Great Britain the most powerful nation in the world.

The Industrial Revolution didn't spring from a single factor but from several related developments that interacted to change the world profoundly. Improvements in iron production allowed the construction of efficient, reliable steam engines, which were then used to improve iron production even further. Manufacturing became concentrated in factories filled with automated machinery, while canals and improved roads carried raw materials in and finished products out.

People grew used to the availability of cheap, mass-produced goods shipped from other parts of the country or the world. But they also grew used to living in crowded cities and working in factories and mills, often for meager wages under dangerous, exhausting conditions. Progress made a small number of people very wealthy, while condemning a large portion of the population to danger and squalor.

Opposition came from skilled workers whose jobs were replaced by machines, and from influential poets who mourned the loss of what they saw as an idyllic, rural way of life. This opposition was brutally repressed, and even those who championed workers' rights sometimes found themselves under attack by the British Army.

The Industrial Revolution changed nearly every aspect of British life and spread from Great Britain to most of the developed world. This is the story of a revolution whose effects continue to shape our lives today.