New Mills in Bowden Middlecale: Domestic Textiles in the Rural Economy before the Industrial Revolution and the Change to Factory Cotton

Abstract

The year 1996 is being celebrated as Visual Arts Year in the North of England. From 21 September 1996, an Exhibition ‘People and Patterns’ at The John and Josephine Bowes Museum, Barnard Castle, County Durham, will describe the local carpet industry, which supplied the London and provincial trade for many years during the nineteenth century. The Exhibition closes on 5 January 1997     

Transferring the Spinning Jenny to Barcelona: An Apprenticeship in the Technology of the Industrial Revolution

Abstract

The exceptional documentation which exists on the introduction of the spinning jenny in Barcelona between 1784 and 1788 has been used in this article to reconstruct the early history of Spain's first cotton spinning mill. The extent of the data available serves to provide information on the technical characteristics of the machine. Of particular interest is the information about the character of the pre-spinning processes before the adoption of the carding engine. Light is also thrown on the issue of technological transfer, shown to be a 'wide' process requiring the learning of manufacturing as well as machine-making skills.