ufacture of woolen goods is due to the introduction of worsted cloth for men's wear and the development of knit-goods manufacture. The change from one to the other was incident upon the mechanical improvements which made possible the combing of short staple wool and to the adaptation of American wools to the combing process consequent upon the crossing of the merino sheep with those of English blood. See Agriculture.
The manufacture of worsteds began in 1843, The progress has been rapid and steady, the value of the product in 1900, $120,314,344, being in excess of the value of woolen goods for the same year. There were 57,008 persons engaged as wage-earners in the industry. The first carpet manufactory was opened in 1791. The power loom was adapted to the weaving of ingrain carpets in 1844, and later to the weaving of Jacquard Brussels, Wilton, tapestry Brussels, and other makes. In 1900 28,411 persons were engaged as wage-earners in the industry and the product was valued at $48,192,351. The value of felt goods in 1900 was $6,461,691, and wool hats, $3,591,940. The woolen industry is almost wholly confined to the New England and the Middle Atlantic States, Massachusetts and Pennsylvania together producing over half the total product. Pennsylvania—chiefly Philadelphia—produces 48 per cent. of the carpet product of the United States. The following table shows the number of spindles employed in wool manufactures:
Comparative Statement of Spindles, 1890 and 1900
| Woolen | Worsted | Cotton | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 1900 | 1890 | 1900 | 1890 | 1900 | 1890 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|
|
|
|
|
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Total | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Hosiery and Knit Goods. The hosiery and knit goods products were formerly classed with the woolen goods, but since cotton has become the chief material used they have been separately classified. The industry is of recent development and has almost equaled the worsted and the silk industry in rapidity of growth. In 1850 the product was valued at only $1,028,102; in 1900 it was over 90 times that value. In the latter year 83,387 persons were engaged as wage-earners in the industry. New York and Pennsylvania produced about four-sevenths of the total product.
Silk Manufactures. In 1850 the value of silk manufactured in the United States was $1,809,476. In 1900 it was 60 times that amount, and the amount of raw silk consumed exceeded that consumed in France, the largest European manufacturer of silk. There were 483 establishments, employing 65,416 wage-earners. Almost the entire supply of raw silk used in the census year, 9,760,770 pounds, was imported from Japan, China, and Italy. The principal silk manufacturing district is northern New Jersey, after which come Pennsylvania, New York, and Connecticut.
Flax, Hemp, and Jute Manufactures. The value of the flax, hemp, and jute products increased from $37,313,021 in 1890 to $47,601,607 in 1900. In the latter year there were 20,903 wage-earners employed in 141 establishments. Binder twine and rope together constitute about five-ninths of the total product. Hemp is the principal material used. Very little success has attended the spasmodic attempts to establish linen manufactures in the United States. The flax grown here is not suitable for spinning. Massachusetts, New York, and Pennsylvania are the chief manufacturing States in this line.
Clothing. The production of men's ready-made or ‘factory-made’ clothing was already well advanced by 1850, but the manufacture of women's ready-made clothing has developed almost wholly since then. The total value of men's clothing—factory product—in 1900 was $276,861,607, an increase of 10.3 per cent. between 1890 and 1900, a decrease in price having made this figure much smaller than it would have been on the old scale of prices. The value of women's factory-made clothing meanwhile increased 133.8 per cent., the value in 1900 being $159,339,539. There are few other important branches of industry that employ so many wage-earners in proportion to the value of the product. In 1900 there were 120,950 engaged in the manufacture of men's clothing, and 83,739 in that of women's clothing. Since about 1870, however, there has been a revolution in the system of manufacturing men's clothing, resulting from the greater division of labor and the use of machinery, so that there has been a decrease of nearly one-fourth in the number of wage-earners.
Prior to about 1876 ready-made clothing was made principally by skilled tailors, assisted by members of their household. About that time the ‘team-work’ and task-price system was introduced, which divided the work between a number of persons. Each person performs only a small detail of the work, and little or no skill is required. Since the work requires no previous experience and no knowledge of the language, the unskilled foreign element in the large population centres have naturally drifted into it. The manufacturer, after the cloth and the linings have been cut, usually lets the work to contractors, who sublet it to be done in private houses or small workshops. This ‘sweating system,’ so called, represents one of the most unsatisfactory labor conditions in America. Very recently a new system, called in contradistinction the ‘factory’ system, is supplanting the task system. More persons are employed in a shop, and sometimes more than 100 persons are engaged in the making of one coat. More skill is required in the manufacture of women's clothing, and the task system has not been applied much in cloak manufacture. Considerably over one-third of the total product of men's ready-made clothing and over two-thirds of women's ready-made clothing are made in New York City. The increase in the value of men's ready-made clothing between 1890 and 1900
