> Makes me wonder what the real common discourse was of looms during the industrial revolution, and not just the modern summary of that era.
Interesting question. I did a little searching with help from Claude, ChatGPT, Google, and the Internet Archive. Here are some links to writings from that time:
“Thoughts on the use of machines, in the cotton manufacture” (1780)
Excerpt: “How many writers and copiers of books were thrown out of employment, or obliged to change it, by the introduction of printing presses? About ten years ago, when the Spinning Jennies came up, old persons, children, and those who could not easily learn to use the new machines, did suffer, for a while; till families had learned to play into one another's hands, by each taking a different kind of work. But the general benefit, which was received from the machines, very soon silenced all objections. And every sensible man now looks upon them with gratitude and approbation. It is probable, this will be the case in all new inventions.”
Kevin Binfield, ed., Writings of the Luddites (1811-1815; 2004)
Interesting question. I did a little searching with help from Claude, ChatGPT, Google, and the Internet Archive. Here are some links to writings from that time:
“Thoughts on the use of machines, in the cotton manufacture” (1780)
https://archive.org/details/bim_eighteenth-century_thoughts-...
Excerpt: “How many writers and copiers of books were thrown out of employment, or obliged to change it, by the introduction of printing presses? About ten years ago, when the Spinning Jennies came up, old persons, children, and those who could not easily learn to use the new machines, did suffer, for a while; till families had learned to play into one another's hands, by each taking a different kind of work. But the general benefit, which was received from the machines, very soon silenced all objections. And every sensible man now looks upon them with gratitude and approbation. It is probable, this will be the case in all new inventions.”
Kevin Binfield, ed., Writings of the Luddites (1811-1815; 2004)
https://ia903409.us.archive.org/16/items/writings-of-the-lud...
Robert Owen, Observations on the effect of the manufacturing system (1817)
https://archive.org/details/observationsonef00owenrich/page/...
William Radcliffe, Origin of the new system of manufacture commonly called power-loom weaving (1828)
https://archive.org/details/originofnewsyste0000radc
“An address to the Glasgow cotton-spinners on the moral bearing of their association” (1838)
https://catalogue.nla.gov.au/catalog/6023196