XI Eli Whitney
The young people all came in laughing.
“And what is it?” said Uncle Fritz, good-naturedly.
“It is this,” said Alice, “that I say that all this is very entertaining about Palissy the Potter and Benvenuto Cellini; and I have been boasting that I know as much of the steam-engine as Lucy did, who was ‘sister to Harry.’ But I do not see that this is going to profit Blanche when she shall make her celebrated visit to Mr. Bright, and when he asks her what is the last sweet thing in creels or in fly-frames.”
“Is it certain that Blanche is to go?” said Uncle Fritz, doubtfully.
“Oh, dear, Uncle Fritz, do you know?” said Blanche, in mock heroics; “are you in the sacred circle which decides? Will the Vesuvius pass its dividend, or will it scatter its blessings right and left, so that we can go to Paris and all the world be happy?”
“I wish I knew,” said Colonel Ingham; “for on that same dividend depends the question whether I build four new rooms at Little Crastis for the accommodation of my young friends when they visit me there.”
“Could you tell us,” said Fergus, “what is the cause of the depression in the cotton-manufacture?”
“Don’t tell him, Uncle Fritz,” said Fanchon, “for the two best of reasons,—first, that half of us will not understand if you do; and second, that none of us will remember.”
Colonel Ingham laughed. “And third,” he said, “that we are to talk about Inventions and Inventors, and we shall not get to Fergus’s grand question till we come to the series on ‘Political Economy and Political Economists.’
“You are all quite right in all your suggestions and criticisms. It is quite time that you girls should know something of the industry which is important not only to all the Southern States, but to all the manufacturing States. Cotton is the cheapest article for clothing in the world, and the use of it goes farther and farther every year. The manufacture is also improving steadily. Thirty men, women, and children will make as much cotton cloth to-day as a hundred could make the year you were born, Hester. I saw cottons for sale to-day at four cents a yard which would have cost nearly three times that money thirty years ago. So I have laid out for you these sketches of the life of Eli Whitney, on whose simple invention, as you remember, all this wealth of production may be said to depend. You college boys ought to be pleased to know, that within a year after this man graduated from Yale College, he had made an invention and set it a going, which entirely changed the face of things in his own country. At that moment there was so little cotton raised in America, that Whitney himself had never seen cotton wool or cotton seed, when he was first asked if he could make a machine which would separate one from the other. It was so little known, indeed, that when John Jay of New York negotiated a treaty of commerce with England in 1794, the year after Whitney’s invention, he did not know that any cotton was produced in the United States. The treaty did not provide for our cotton, and had to be changed after it was brought back to America. With this invention by Whitney, it was possible to clean cotton from the seed. The Southern States, which before had no staple of importance, had in that moment an immense addition to their resources. Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Tennessee, besides the States in the old thirteen, were settled almost wholly to call into being new lands for raising cotton. To these were afterwards added Arkansas, Florida, and Texas. With this new industry slave labor became vastly more profitable; and the institution of slavery, which would else have died out probably, received an immense stimulus. Fortunately for the country and the world, the Constitution had fixed the year 1808, as the end of the African slave trade. But, up to that date, slaves were pushed in with a constantly increasing rapidity, so that the new States were peopled very largely with absolute barbarians. There is hardly another instance in history where it is so easy to trace in a very few years, results so tremendous following from a single invention by a single man.
“Fortunately for us, Miss Lamb has just published a portrait of Eli Whitney in the ‘Magazine of History.’ Here it is, in the October number of the ‘Magazine of History.’
“As to processes of manufacture, of course we can learn little or nothing about them here. But you had better read carefully this article in Ure’s ‘Dictionary of Arts,’ though it is a little old-fashioned, and then you will be prepared to make up parties to go out to the Hecla, or up to Lowell or Lawrence, where you can see with your own eyes.
“And now I will read you a little sketch of the life of Eli Whitney.”
Eli Whitney
Eli Whitney was born at Westborough, Worcester County, Massachusetts, Dec. 8, 1765. His parents belonged to the middle class in society, who, by the labors of husbandry, managed by uniform industry and strict frugality to provide well for a rising family.
The paternal ancestors of Mr. Whitney emigrated from England among the early settlers of Massachusetts, and their descendants were among the most respectable farmers of Worcester County. His maternal ancestors, of the name of Fay, were also English emigrants, and ranked among the substantial yeomanry of Massachusetts. A family tradition respecting the occasion of their coming to this country may serve to illustrate the history of the times. The story is, that about two hundred years ago, the father of the family, who resided in England, a man of large property and great respectability, called together his sons and addressed them thus: “America is to be a great country. I am too old to emigrate myself; but if any one of you will go, I will give him a double share of my property.” The youngest son instantly declared his willingness to go, and his brothers gave their consent. He soon set off for the New World, and landed in Boston, in the neighborhood of which place he purchased a large tract of land, where he enjoyed the satisfaction of receiving two visits from his venerable father. His son John Fay, from whom the subject of this memoir is immediately descended, removed from Boston to Westborough, where he became the proprietor of a large tract of land, since known by the name of the Fay Farm.
From the sister of Mr. Whitney, we have derived some particulars respecting his childhood and youth, and we shall present the anecdotes to our readers in the artless style in which they are related by our correspondent, believing that they would be more acceptable in this simple dress than if, according to the modest suggestion of the writer, they should be invested with a more labored diction. The following incident, though trivial in itself, will serve to show at how early a period certain qualities of strong feeling tempered by prudence, for which Mr. Whitney afterward became distinguished, began to display themselves. When he was six or seven years old he had overheard the kitchen maid, in a fit of passion, calling his mother, who was in a delicate state of health, hard names, at which he expressed great displeasure to his sister. “She thought,” said he, “that I was not big enough to hear her talk so about my mother. I think she ought to have a flogging; and if I knew how to bring it about, she should have one.” His sister advised him to tell their father. “No,” he replied, “it will hurt his feelings and mother’s too; and besides, it is likely the girl will say she never said so, and that would make a quarrel. It is best to say nothing about it.”
Indications of his mechanical genius were likewise developed at a very early age. Of his early passion for such employments, his sister gives the following account: “Our father had a workshop, and sometimes made wheels of different kinds, and chairs. He had a variety of tools, and a lathe for turning chair-posts. This gave my brother an opportunity of learning the use of tools when very young. He lost no time; but as soon as he could handle tools, he was always making something in the shop, and seemed not to like working on the farm. On a time, after the death of our mother, when our father had been absent from home two or three days, on his return he inquired of the housekeeper what the boys had been doing. She told him what B. and J. had been about. ‘But what has Eli been doing?’ said he. She replied he had been making a fiddle. ‘Ah,’ said he, despondingly, ‘I fear Eli will have to take his portion in fiddles.’ He was at this time about twelve years old. His sister adds that this fiddle was finished throughout, like a common violin, and made tolerably good music. It was examined by many persons, and all pronounced it to be a remarkable piece of work for such a boy to perform. From this time he was employed to repair violins, and had many nice jobs, which were always executed to the entire satisfaction, and often to the astonishment, of his customers. His father’s watch being the greatest piece of mechanism that had yet presented itself to his observation, he was extremely desirous of examining its interior construction, but was not permitted to do so. One Sunday morning, observing that his father was going to meeting, and would leave at home the wonderful little machine, he immediately feigned illness as an apology for not going to church. As soon as the family were out of sight, he flew to the room where the watch hung, and taking it down he was so delighted with its motions that he took it all to pieces before he thought of the consequences of his rash deed; for his father was a stern parent, and punishment would have been the reward of his idle curiosity, had the mischief been detected. He, however, put all the work so neatly together that his father never discovered his audacity until he himself told him, many years afterwards.
“Whitney lost his mother at an early age, and when he was thirteen years old his father married a second time. His stepmother, among her articles of furniture, had a handsome set of table knives that she valued very highly. Whitney could not but see this, and said to her, ‘I could make as good ones if I had tools, and I could make the necessary tools if I had a few common tools to make them with.’ His stepmother thought he was deriding her, and was much displeased; but it so happened, not long afterwards, that one of the knives got broken, and he made one exactly like it in every respect except the stamp on the blade. This he would likewise have executed, had not the tools required been too expensive for his slender resources.”
When Whitney was fifteen or sixteen years of age he suggested to his father an enterprise, which was an earnest of the similar undertakings in which he engaged on a far greater scale in later life. This being the time of the Revolutionary War, nails were in great demand and bore a high price. At that period nails were made chiefly by hand, with little aid from machinery. Young Whitney proposed to his father to procure him a few tools, and to permit him to set up the manufacture. His father consented; and he went steadily to work, and suffered nothing to divert him from his task until his day’s work was completed. By extraordinary diligence he gained time to make tools for his own use, and to put in knife-blades, and to perform many other curious little jobs which exceeded the skill of the country artisans. At this laborious occupation the enterprising boy wrought alone, with great success, and with much profit to his father, for two winters, pursuing the ordinary labors of the farm during the summers. At this time he devised a plan for enlarging his business and increasing his profits. He whispered his scheme to his sister, with strong injunctions of secrecy; and requesting leave of his father to go to a neighboring town, without specifying his object, he set out on horseback in quest of a fellow-laborer. Not finding one as easily as he had anticipated, he proceeded from town to town with a perseverance which was always a strong trait of his character, until, at a distance of forty miles from home, he found such a workman as he desired. He also made his journey subservient to his mechanical skill, for he called at every workshop on his way and gleaned all the information he could respecting the mechanical arts.
At the close of the war the business of making nails was no longer profitable; but a fashion prevailing among the ladies of fastening on their bonnets with long pins, he contrived to make those with such skill and dexterity that he nearly monopolized the business, although he devoted to it only such seasons of leisure as he could redeem from the occupations of the farm, to which he now principally betook himself. He added to this article, the manufacture of walking-canes, which he made with peculiar neatness.
In respect to his proficiency in learning while young, we are informed that he early manifested a fondness for figures and an uncommon aptitude for arithmetical calculations, though in the other rudiments of education he was not particularly distinguished. Yet at the age of fourteen he had acquired so much general information, as to be regarded on this account, as well as on account of his mechanical skill, a very remarkable boy.
From the age of nineteen, young Whitney conceived the idea of obtaining a liberal education; but, being warmly opposed by his stepmother, he was unable to procure the decided consent of his father, until he had reached the age of twenty-three years. But, partly by the avails of his manual labor and partly by teaching a village school, he had been so far able to surmount the obstacles thrown in his way, that he had prepared himself for the Freshman Class in Yale College, which he entered in May, 1789.
The propensity of Mr. Whitney to mechanical inventions and occupations, was frequently apparent during his residence at college. On a particular occasion, one of the tutors, happening to mention some interesting philosophical experiment, regretted that he could not exhibit it to his pupils, because the apparatus was out of order and must be sent abroad to be repaired. Mr. Whitney proposed to undertake this task, and performed it greatly to the satisfaction of the faculty of the college.
A carpenter being at work upon one of the buildings of the gentleman with whom Mr. Whitney boarded, the latter begged permission to use his tools, during the intervals of study; but the mechanic, being a man of careful habits, was unwilling to trust them with a student, and it was only after the gentleman of the house had become responsible for all damages, that he would grant the permission. But Mr. Whitney had no sooner commenced his operations than the carpenter was surprised at his dexterity, and exclaimed, “There was one good mechanic spoiled when you went to college.”
Soon after Mr. Whitney took his degree, in the autumn of 1792, he entered into an engagement with a Mr. B. of Georgia, to reside in his family as a private teacher. On his way thither, he was so fortunate as to have the company of Mrs. Greene, the widow of General Greene, who, with her family, was returning to Savannah after spending the summer at the North. At that time it was deemed unsafe to travel through our country without having had the small-pox, and accordingly Mr. Whitney prepared himself for the excursion, by procuring inoculation while in New York. As soon as he was sufficiently recovered, the party set sail for Savannah. As his health was not fully re-established, Mrs. Greene kindly invited him to go with the family to her residence at Mulberry Grove, near Savannah, and remain until he was recruited. The invitation was accepted; but lest he should not yet have lost all power of communicating that dreadful disease, Mrs. Greene had white flags (the meaning of which was well understood) hoisted at the landing and at all the avenues leading to the house. As a requital for her hospitality, her guest procured the virus and inoculated all the servants of the household, more than fifty in number, and carried them safely through the disorder.
Mr. Whitney had scarcely set his foot in Georgia, before he was met by a disappointment which was an earnest of that long series of adverse events which, with scarcely an exception, attended all his future negotiations in the same State. On his arrival he was informed that Mr. B. had employed another teacher, leaving Whitney entirely without resources or friends, except those whom he had made in the family of General Greene. In these benevolent people, however, his case excited much interest; and Mrs. Greene kindly said to him, “My young friend, you propose studying the law; make my house your home, your room your castle, and there pursue what studies you please.” He accordingly began the study of the law under that hospitable roof.
Mrs. Greene was engaged in a piece of embroidery in which she employed a peculiar kind of frame, called a tambour. She complained that it was badly constructed, and that it tore the delicate threads of her work. Mr. Whitney, eager for an opportunity to oblige his hostess, set himself to work and speedily produced a tambour-frame, made on a plan entirely new, which he presented to her. Mrs. Greene and her family were greatly delighted with it, and thought it a wonderful proof of ingenuity.
Not long afterwards a large party of gentlemen, consisting principally of officers who had served under the General in the Revolutionary Army, came from Augusta and the upper country, to visit the family of General Greene. They fell into conversation upon the state of agriculture among them, and expressed great regret that there was no means of cleansing the green seed cotton, or separating it from its seed, since all the lands which were unsuitable for the cultivation of rice, would yield large crops of cotton. But until ingenuity could devise some machine which would greatly facilitate the process of cleaning, it was vain to think of raising cotton for market. Separating one pound of the clean staple from the seed was a day’s work for a woman; but the time usually devoted to picking cotton was the evening, after the labor of the field was over. Then the slaves—men, women, and children—were collected in circles, with one whose duty it was to rouse the dozing and quicken the indolent. While the company were engaged in this conversation, “Gentlemen,” said Mrs. Greene, “apply to my young friend Mr. Whitney; he can make anything.” Upon which she conducted them into a neighboring room, and showed them her tambour-frame and a number of toys which Mr. Whitney had made or repaired for the children. She then introduced the gentlemen to Whitney himself, extolling his genius and commending him to their notice and friendship. He modestly disclaimed all pretensions to mechanical genius; and when they named their object, he replied that he had never seen either cotton or cotton seed in his life. Mrs. Greene said to one of the gentlemen, “I have accomplished my aim. Mr. Whitney is a very deserving young man, and to bring him into notice was my object. The interest which our friends now feel for him will, I hope, lead to his getting some employment to enable him to prosecute the study of the law.”
But a new turn, that no one of the company dreamed of, had been given to Mr. Whitney’s views. It being out of season for cotton in the seed, he went to Savannah and searched among the warehouses and boats until he found a small parcel of it. This he carried home, and communicated his intentions to Mr. Miller, who warmly encouraged him, and assigned him a room in the basement of the house, where he set himself to work with such rude materials and instruments as a Georgia plantation afforded. With these resources, however, he made tools better suited to his purpose, and drew his own wire (of which the teeth of the earliest gins were made),—an article which was not at that time to be found in the market of Savannah. Mrs. Greene and Mr. Miller were the only persons ever admitted to his workshop, and the only persons who knew in what way he was employing himself. The many hours he spent in his mysterious pursuits, afforded matter of great curiosity and often of raillery to the younger members of the family. Near the close of the winter, the machine was so nearly completed as to leave no doubt of its success.
Mrs. Greene was eager to communicate to her numerous friends the knowledge of this important invention, peculiarly important at that time, because then the market was glutted with all those articles which were suited to the climate and soil of Georgia, and nothing could be found to give occupation to the negroes and support to the white inhabitants. This opened suddenly to the planters boundless resources of wealth, and rendered the occupations of the slaves less unhealthy and laborious than they had been before.
Mrs. Greene, therefore, invited to her house gentlemen from different parts of the State; and on the first day after they had assembled, she conducted them to a temporary building which had been erected for the machine, and they saw with astonishment and delight, that more cotton could be separated from the seed in one day, by the labor of a single hand, than could be done in the usual manner in the space of many months.
Mr. Whitney might now have indulged in bright reveries of fortune and of fame; but we shall have various opportunities of seeing that he tempered his inventive genius with an unusual share of the calm, considerate qualities of the financier. Although urged by his friends to secure a patent and devote himself to the manufacture and introduction of his machines, he coolly replied that, on account of the great expenses and trouble which always attend the introduction of a new invention, and the difficulty of enforcing a law in favor of patentees, in opposition to the individual interests of so large a number of persons as would be concerned in the culture of this article, it was with great reluctance that he should consent to relinquish the hopes of a lucrative profession, for which he had been destined, with an expectation of indemnity either from the justice or the gratitude of his countrymen, even should the invention answer the most sanguine anticipations of his friends.
The individual who contributed most to incite him to persevere in the undertaking, was Phineas Miller. Mr. Miller was a native of Connecticut and a graduate of Yale College. Like Mr. Whitney, soon after he had completed his education at college, he came to Georgia as a private teacher in the family of General Greene, and after the decease of the General, he became the husband of Mrs. Greene. He had qualified himself for the profession of the law, and was a gentleman of cultivated mind and superior talents; but he was of an ardent temperament, and therefore well fitted to enter with zeal into the views which the genius of his friend had laid open to him. He also had considerable funds at command, and proposed to Mr. Whitney to become his joint adventurer, and to be at the whole expense of maturing the invention until it should be patented. If the machine should succeed in its intended operation, the parties agreed, under legal formalities, “that the profits and advantages arising therefrom, as well as all privileges and emoluments to be derived from patenting, making, vending, and working the same, should be mutually and equally shared between them.” This instrument bears date May 27, 1793; and immediately afterward they commenced business under the firm of Miller and Whitney.
An invention so important to the agricultural interest (and, as it has proved, to every department of human industry) could not long remain a secret. The knowledge of it soon spread through the State, and so great was the excitement on the subject, that multitudes of persons came from all quarters of the State to see the machine; but it was not deemed safe to gratify their curiosity until the patent right had been secured. But so determined were some of the populace to possess this treasure, that neither law nor justice could restrain them; they broke open the building by night, and carried off the machine. In this way the public became possessed of the invention; and before Mr. Whitney could complete his model and secure his patent, a number of machines were in successful operation, constructed with some slight deviation from the original, with the hope of escaping the penalty for evading the patent right.
As soon as the copartnership of Miller and Whitney was formed, Mr. Whitney repaired to Connecticut, where, as far as possible, he was to perfect the machine, obtain a patent, and manufacture and ship to Georgia such a number of machines as would supply the demand.
Within three days after the conclusion of the copartnership, Mr. Whitney having set out for the North, Mr. Miller commenced his long correspondence relative to the cotton-gin. The first letter announces that encroachments upon their rights had already begun. “It will be necessary,” says Mr. Miller, “to have a considerable number of gins made, to be in readiness to send out as soon as the patent is obtained, in order to satisfy the absolute demands, and make people’s heads easy on the subject; for I am informed of two other claimants for the honor of the invention of cotton-gins, in addition to those we knew before.”
On the 20th of June, 1793, Mr. Whitney presented his patent to Mr. Jefferson, then Secretary of State; but the prevalence of the yellow fever in Philadelphia (which was then the seat of government) prevented his concluding the business relative to the patent until several months afterwards. To prevent being anticipated, he took, however, the precaution to make oath to the invention before the notary public of the city of New Haven, which he did on the 28th of October of the same year.
Mr. Jefferson, who had much curiosity in regard to mechanical inventions, took a peculiar interest in this machine, and addressed to the inventor an obliging letter, desiring farther particulars respecting it, and expressing a wish to procure one for his own use.21 Mr. Whitney accordingly sketched the history of the invention, and of the construction and performances of the machine. “It is about a year,” says he, “since I first turned my attention to constructing this machine, at which time I was in the State of Georgia. Within about ten days after my first conception of the plan, I made a small though imperfect model. Experiments with this encouraged me to make one on a larger scale; but the extreme difficulty of procuring workmen and proper materials in Georgia prevented my completing the larger one until some time in April last. This, though much larger than my first attempt, is not above one third as large as the machines may be made with convenience. The cylinder is only two feet two inches in length, and six inches in diameter. It is turned by hand, and requires the strength of one man to keep it in constant motion. It is the stated task of one negro to clean fifty weight (I mean fifty pounds after it is separated from the seed) of the green cotton seed per day.”
In the year 1812 Mr. Whitney made application to Congress for the renewal of his patent for the cotton-gin. In his memorial he presented a history of the struggles he had been forced to encounter in defence of his right, observing that he had been unable to obtain any decision on the merits of his claim until he had been eleven years in the law, and thirteen years of his patent term had expired. He sets forth that his invention had been a source of opulence to thousands of the citizens of the United States; that, as a labor-saving machine, it would enable one man to perform the work of a thousand men; and that it furnishes to the whole family of mankind, at a very cheap rate, the most essential article of their clothing. Hence he humbly conceived himself entitled to a further remuneration from his country, and thought he ought to be admitted to a more liberal participation with his fellow-citizens in the benefits of his invention. Although so great advantages had been already experienced, and the prospect of future benefits was so promising, still, many of those whose interest had been most enhanced by this invention, had obstinately persisted in refusing to make any compensation to the inventor. The very men whose wealth had been acquired by the use of this machine, and who had grown rich beyond all former example, had combined their exertions to prevent the patentee from deriving any emolument from his invention. From that State in which he had first made and where he had first introduced his machine, and which had derived the most signal benefits from it, he had received nothing; and from no State had he received the amount of half a cent per pound on the cotton cleaned with his machines in one year. Estimating the value of the labor of one man at twenty cents per day, the whole amount which had been received by him for his invention was not equal to the value of the labor saved in one hour by his machines then in use in the United States. “This invention,” he proceeds, “now gives to the southern section of the Union, over and above the profits which would be derived from the cultivation of any other crop, an annual emolument of at least three millions of dollars.”22 The foregoing statement does not rest on conjecture, it is no visionary speculation,—all these advantages have been realized; the planters of the Southern States have counted the cash, felt the weight of it in their pockets, and heard the exhilarating sound of its collision. Nor do the advantages stop here. This immense source of wealth is but just beginning to be opened. Cotton is a more cleanly and healthful article of cultivation than tobacco and indigo, which it has superseded, and does not so much impoverish the soil. This invention has already trebled the value of the land through a large extent of territory; and the degree to which the cultivation of cotton may be still augmented, is altogether incalculable. This species of cotton has been known in all countries where cotton has been raised, from time immemorial, but was never known as an article of commerce until since this method of cleaning it was discovered. In short (to quote the language of Judge Johnson), “if we should assert that the benefits of this invention exceed one hundred millions of dollars, we could prove the assertion by correct calculation.” It is objected that if the patentee succeeds in procuring the renewal of his patent, he will be too rich. There is no probability that the patentee, if the term of his patent were extended for twenty years, would ever obtain for his invention one half as much as many an individual will gain by use of it. Up to the present time, the whole amount of what he has acquired from this source (after deducting his expenses) does not exceed one half the sum which a single individual has gained by the use of the machine in one year. It is true that considerable sums have been obtained from some of the States where the machine is used; but no small portion of these sums has been expended in prosecuting his claim in a State where nothing has been obtained, and where his machine has been used to the greatest advantage.
There was much more which was curious, laid out in different books; but the call came for supper, and the young people obeyed.