Over the years we Americans have made many advances in the technological part of our lives. These advantages rank as small as the invention of the toilet to planes that fly around the sky everyday of our lives. These changes affect us in more ways than we ever could imagine. Most people over look the fact that we would not be who we are today with out the inventions of the Industrial revolution. Each of these inventions affected us in many positive in negative ways. One of these inventions that affected us the most was the Cotton Gin.
The Cotton Gin was a simple invention created by Eli Whitney in 1793. It made it easier for workers to separate the seeds from by simply turning a crank. The Cotton Gin could produce as much cotton as one-hundred could in a day in only an hour. This allowed the price of cotton to decrease at a tremendous rate. Only this impact only helped the south.
Even though the Cotton Gin brought on a list of positive outlooks the negative massively out weigh them. As cotton production increased the southerners began to rely mainly on their crop of cotton. As the southerners began to plant more and more of the cotton their soil began to lose all the valuable nutrients and non-nourishable soil would just not suffice their needs. They began moving west negotiating land treaties with the Indians to push them back farther west and with the fall back of the Indians the vastness of the cotton fields began increasing indefinitely.
You may think where the production of cotton increased the population of slaves in the south would decrease as well, but you are wrong. As the process of separating the seeds, and the size of the cotton fields increased so did the slaves. They needed someone to tend to the fields and pick the cotton faster so they could keep up with the production of cotton. Slaves hardly ever got a break now they’d work from the wee hours of the morning to late at night. They never stopped unless the blessing of unconsciousness, or even death over came the poor helpless souls.
Not only did the slaves take this as a form of torture so did the abolitionists of the north. The northerners did not believe that the slave should be treated so cruelly for it was inhumane and pitiful at the least. So when the southerners began to import new slaves this was just something to help provoke the north.
With the Cotton Gin still running full force the south continued to import slaves. By April 12, 1861 the north had had enough, and on top of that the sixteenth president Abraham Lincoln abolished slavery and this was more than enough for the south. The civil war began with the north fighting to keep the abolishment of slaves. Leaving the south fighting for the people that allow them to keep all the money and not work a day in their live unless it was to trade or whip an unsuspecting slave.
The war ended on April 9, 1865, and in those four years more Americans died than in any other year because we had lost hold on reality, and were fighting our selves. Finally the north had raged victorious and the south was at a feat. Slavery was abolished and now we could once again come together as a union because the war was over.
Some people may ask,” Why this is a problem if it abolished slavery?” This may be true, but it also showed how weak and on edge our country was. We were weak because we started a massacre of our own people because we could not compromise on what was best for each individual and what was best for the country. We were on edge because we were still just beginning to learn and live as and independent country the invitation of a way to let of steam and stress was highly welcomed.
The Cotton Gin destroyer or best thing that ever happened to us is a major argument. I believe that it was a horrendous occurrence that almost destroyed us as a nation. Weather good or bad out of all the inventions in the Industrial Revolution the cotton Gin undeniably impacted us the most.
