The Industrial Revolution

A few specific factors of daily life in which improvement occurred were, in agriculture, manufacturing, and transportation, which gave a profound effect on Europe. The industrial revolution could be compared to the renaissance, for it eventually occurred all throughout the world and was another major turning point in human history, where almost all aspects of our daily life have been influenced in some way and then advanced to inch nearer to what we know as the golden age.

Before 1750, the seven million people who lived in Britain mostly lived in small villages and farming was their main occupation. People grew their own food and apart from London there was no other city and there were neither any factories. They were few industries throughout Britain, most of which made iron, woolen cloth or mined coal.

As the industrial revolution began, between 1750 and 1850 Britain became an industrialized country and its population increased rapidly, so much so that by 1851 Britain had gotten 21 million people, half of whom lived in large cities. More industries had been set, out of which the most prominent were coal mining, iron and steel, cotton, wool and shipbuilding. This all would often be referred to as the first revolution.

By 1880 Germany and other countries in Europe began to challenge Britain. At this point in time Britain began its second Industrial Revolution and began to develop new industries such as motorcars, bicycles, electrical engineering and chemicals. Although new industries had been made, Britain still depent on the old industries, such as steel, coal mining and shipbuilding, for money.

The industrial revolution aided the middle class of Europe triumph. Due to the many various industries set up, there became more factories and even mills, which decreased unemployment. Although more people could obtain jobs, it was under strict conditions with long hours of work, however, these factors were even present before the industrial revolution had taken place.

The revolution had also made changes for factories for it led to the creating of factories, which was a major influence on the rise of our modern cities. This could be seen in Manchester, which could be seen as the world’s first industrial city. During the 19th century small mills, which mostly ran on waterpower, did all major productions but later on, factories began to run on steam power.

The revolution also led to increasing child labour in Europe, for with a increasing population of children, expenses had increased and thus children had to work for long hard hours. Even though their work was comparable to that of adult workers, most people paid them less.

The feudal castes were also made more prominent as the rich had luxurious lives with large homes loosely modeled on castles, surrounded by massive gardens. The poor on the other hand had small homes on cramped streets, shared toilet facilities with other homes and would have open sewers. Fortunately, during the revolution around in the 19th century, health acts were introduced, which covered such sewers and made Europe more hygienic.

There were many other effects caused by the revolution such as disease spread due to population increase and Luddities attacking factories and machines for taking their jobs.