TOPICS
1.WORKING CONDITIONS
2. SCIENCE AND THE CITY
3. TRANSPORTS
WORKING CONDITIONS
At the start of the Industrial Revolution
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No laws to guarantee the safety of workers.
Workers have to endure long hours of labour.
Workplaces dangerous and unsuitable
the worker becomes sluggish
Reformers
people wanted to change the way factories were run.
fostered some reforms.
REFORMS
Factory Act 1819
Factory Act 1833
Factory Act 1844
Factory Act 1847
Factory Act 1850
Factory Act 1874
Limited the hours worked by children to maximum of 12 per day
Children under 9 banned from working in the textiles industry
and 10-13 year old limited to a 48 hours per week.
Maximum of 12 hours work per day for women.
Maximum of 10 hours work per day for women and children.
Increased hours worked by women and children to 10 and a half
hours a day, but not allowed to work before 6 am or after 6 pm.
No worker allowed to work more than 56,5 hours per week.
• maids for wealthier families
• governesses for rich children
• work in shocking
conditions ALL DAY
• came back home to conduct
the domestic work
“Fortunate “
women
“Unfortunate”
women
• Have to work right up to and straight
after CHILDBIRTH.
The ideal employees :
• were cheap
• weren’t big or educated
enough to argue
• were small enough to fit
between machinery
- Parents were willing to
let children work in
factories as it provided the
family with a higher
income.
SCIENCE AND THE CITY
Diseases
In London in 1840, labourers and servants lived only 22 years on average
CAUSES:
• Cholera
• Dysentery
• Typhoid
Before Pasteur, very little was known
about the nature of urban diseases.
Epidemics were very frequent.
SOLUTIONS:
•Building of sewers
•Introduction of basic hygiene
INNOVATIONS
• electricity
• gas
streets: were lit by gaslight
houses: were lit by paraffin lamps or piped gas lighting
was also used as a power source in workshops and it
gradually began to be used for cooking.
• aniline dyes
are a cheap, coulored, synthetic dyes, adopted by the
textile industry.
TRANSPORTS
Trasports change very quickly in the period 1700-1900 as a result of better
methods of moving goods and new technologies.
ROAD
RAILWAY
CANAL
ROADS
TURNPIKE TRUST
Advantage: really suitable
for transporting fragile
goods along.
Disadvantage:
• the user had to pay a fee
• Rebecca Riots
CANALS
They allow to move large quantities of raw materials
and goods to and from the factories.
Advantage
• fragile goods are trasported without risk of breaking on route.
• cheap to use
Problem
water doesn’t go up and down hills
Answer  using locks
RAILWAYS
This new technology was the result of the invention and subsequent
development of the STEAM ENGINE.
Positive consequences
rapid development of a number of towns.
Negative consequences
many people lost money from previous
investments in canals
- Navvy