Teaching Industrial History through Mathematics Students
| Company | Capital | Yds./Week | Spindles | Looms | Workers |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Merrimack | $1,500,000 | 172,000 | 34,432 | 1253 | 1758 |
| Hamilton | $900,000 | 78,000 | 19,000 | 600 | 1000 |
| Appleton | $500,000 | 80,000 | 10,000 | 350 | 545 |
| Suffolk | $450,000 | 90,000 | 10,240 | 350 | 530 |
| Tremont | $500,000 | 120,000 | 11,000 | 400 | 530 |
Source: Letter written by Kirk Boott, April 20, 1835, referenced in Cotton Goods Guide for Buyer and Seller: A Pocket Manual
- In this activity, you will need color markers to make a bar graph for each of the five mills above. Use one color marker to designate capital, another for yards of cloth produced per week, a third for the number of spindles, a fourth for the number of looms and a fifth color for the number of workers.
- "Spindles" are the parts of spinning machines that twist cotton or wool into yarn. "Looms" are the machines that weave the yarn into cloth. In the chart above, determine: (a) which factory has the fewest spindles per loom? (b) what is the average number of spindles for each loom?
- "Capital" is the amount of money it took to build the mill and to furnish it with the machinery needed to produce cloth. What is the total amount of capital invested per mill? What is the average amount of capital invested per mill?
Usually, the greater the amount of capital invested, the greater the amount of cloth produced per loom and per worker. Use the table above to determine:
- Which of the five mills produced the most cloth per worker in 1835. List the mills in order of their productivity from most productive to least productive.
- Which of the five mills produced the most cloth per loom? List the mills in order of their productivity from most productive to least productive.
- Which of the five mills is the most efficient? How do you determine this?
- There was a big financial "panic" or "depression" in 1837. If you were in charge of things, which two mills might you close down first until things improved?
- Now reach a conclusion. Do the mills with the most capital have the highest productivity?
- The Merrimack Mills were the first mills built in Lowell. Can you think of reasons why it might have required more capital to construct and furnish these mills?
Source: Tsongas Center Source Book - Teaching Industrial History Through Mathematics copyright 1998 Tsongas Industrial History Center
