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Industrial RevolutionA great change in the way people lived!The industrial revolution began in England in the mid 1700's and was a period of great changes in industry, transportation, agriculture, and society. The Enclosure Acts (a series of laws legislating the gathering of all small plots of land into larger clumps with fences) started a huge shift in population. Many poor farmers were unable to pay for fencing to enclose their properties and were forced to sell their land and move to the cities. As a result of having a large, unskilled urban labor force, changes in industry began.The cottage/domestic system of production was replaced by the factory system due to the creation of new machinery and the abundant source of cheap labor. Factories demanded greater amounts of raw materials so new methods of transporting materials needed to be created. Once transportation was improved, it was possible for farms (now more efficient due to increased mechanization) to support a larger urban population. The industry in Great Britain that first started to see these changes was textiles (clothing manufacturing). We would refer to it as the trigger industry. When the United States began to industrialize, the trigger industry was railroads. Results of the Industrial Revolution:
1. Click here to go to The Internet Modern History Sourcebook and access files about the Industrial Revolution.
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