American Economic Growth
Throughout the early nineteenth century, America began to transform from an agriculture based society to an industrialized society. The Industrial Revolution hit Britain in the early eighteenth century but did not hit America until the nineteenth century. America was a new nation and was not ready to become industrialized at the same time Britain was ready. However, in America land was cheap, money for investment was plentiful, and raw materials were plentiful. This caused America to be intended for industrial success. Americans did not just wake up one morning to a more economically developed America. Rather, developments in transportation along with developments in manufacturing and agriculture sparked American economic growth because people were able to travel at much faster rates, handmade products became machine made products, and crops could be harvested far more rapidly. Travel time was greatly reduced in the early nineteenth century by the development of new means of transportation such as highways, steamboats, canals, railroads, and clipper ships. These were crucial in transporting raw materials. Roads such as the Lancaster Turnpike played a key role in economics being expanded westward. The steamboats that could quickly transport materials became a key in U.S. trade. In general, each new type of transportation played some kind of role in transporting goods between the country and between other countries. The country would not have been able to grow economically had it not been able to transport the goods. Handmade products could be produced more quickly than ever before. There was once a point in time in which cotton seed had to be separated by hand. However, everything changed when Eli Whitney built a cotton gin. The cotton gin made the process of separating cotton seed 50 times more effective, causing the cotton industry to become profitable and the South to flourish. Along with the cotton gin, Eli Whitney introduced interchangeable parts. The development of interchangeable parts caused machines to be produced quicker and more efficient to ensure that new industries could flourish. In 1846, Elias Howe and Isaac