Max Arthur
History Project 4 – Essay
The Cotton Gin
Even as a child, Eli Whitney loved to invent things. So it’s no surprise that he would go onto invent the cotton gin. After college, he went to live on a plantation known as Mulberry Grove in Georgia. It was there that he realized how hard it was to remove seeds from cotton. That’s when he came up with the cotton gin in 1794.
The cotton gin worked almost like a strainer. It was made out of a wooded cylinder, hooks and a mesh screen. It used hooks to pull the cotton seeds through the screen. It was a double roller machine. It was first powered by hand, then horse and eventually the steam engine.
The cotton gin made making cloth so much easier! Before the cotton gin, only 1 pound of seeds could be removed per day. After this invention, 50 pounds of seeds could be removed per day. Cloth became more available and cheaper to make. Cotton became a very valuable crop in the south. It was even known as “King Cotton.” Due to the rise of cotton production, plantations needed more slaves to keep up with the demand. This was a huge deal because plantation owners did not want slavery to end. Overall, the cotton gin was one of the most valuable inventions ever made in American history.
Bibliography:
- www.americanhistory.about.com
- www.history.com
- www.wikipedia.org