Introduction to Early Industrialization

What you’ll learn to do: describe the causes and effects of industrialization and the goals of workers’ organizations

A photo of a woman working and spinning cotton in the great textile mills in Lawrence, Massachusetts.

Industrialization led to radical changes in American life. New industrial towns, like Waltham, Lowell, and countless others, dotted the landscape of the Northeast. The mills provided many young women an opportunity to experience a new and liberating life, and these workers relished their new freedom. Workers also gained a greater appreciation of the value of their work and, in some instances, began to question the basic fairness of the new industrial order. The world of work had been fundamentally reorganized.