Lowell mills

His vision relied on his "great faith in the people of New England" and employees "would be housed and fed by the company and remain employed only a few years rather than form a permanently downtrodden underclass".

This group of Boston-area merchants were "committed to the ideals of the original Protestant ethic and Republican simplicity" but were nevertheless "shrewd, far-sighted entrepreneurs who were quick to embrace...new investment opportunities".

Not only was it faster and more efficient, it was considered more humane than the textile industry in Great Britain by "paying in cash, hiring young adults instead of children, and by offering employment for only a few years and providing educational opportunities to help workers move on to better jobs".

[1] For the first time in the United States, these mills combined the textile processes of spinning and weaving under one roof, essentially eliminating the "putting-out system" in favor of mass production of high-quality cloth.

In addition to working 80 hours a week, the women had to adhere to strict moral codes (enforced by the matrons) as well as attend religious services and educational classes.

They attended free lectures by Ralph Waldo Emerson and John Quincy Adams and read books they borrowed from circulating libraries.

Overproduction during the 1830s caused the price of finished cloth to drop and the mills' financial situation was exacerbated by a minor depression in 1834 and the Panic of 1837.

[3] Furthermore, mill owners, who were convinced that their employees had become too troublesome, found a new source of labor in the Irish immigrants who were flocking to Massachusetts in 1846 to escape Ireland's Great Famine.

[3] Although most of the original Lowell mill girls were laid off and replaced by immigrants by 1850, the grown, single women who had been used to earning their own money ended up using their education to become librarians, teachers, and social workers.