Industrial Revolution

The Industrial Revolution was he major technological, socioeconomic and cultural change in the late 18th and early 19th century resulting from the replacement of an economy   base on manual labor to one dominated by industry and machine manufacture. It began in England with the introduction of steam power and powered machinery. The development of all-metal machine tools in the first two decades of the nineteenth century the manufacture of more production machines for manufacturing on other industries.
Cities and towns grew dramatically in the first half of the nineteenth century, a phenomenon related to industrialization. Cities had traditionally been centers for princely courts, government and military offices, churches, and commerce. By 1850, especially in Great Britain and Belgium, they were rapidly becoming places for manufacturing and industry. With the steam engine, entrepreneurs could locate their manufacturing plants in urban centers where they had ready access to transportation facilities and influxes of people from the countryside looking for work.
The dramatic growth of cities in the first half of the nineteenth century produced miserable living conditions for many of the inhabitants. Of course, this had been true for centuries in European cities, but the rapid urbanization associated with the Industrial Revolution intensified the problems and made these wretched conditions all the more apparent. Wealthy, middle-class in habitants, as usual, insulated themselves as best they could, often living in suburbs or the outer ring of the city where they could have individual houses and gardens.
Workers in the new industrial factories faced horrible working conditions. They worked anywhere from twelve to sixteen hours a day and six days a week with only a half hour for dinner and lunch. There was no security of employment and no minimum wage. Both women and children were employed in large numbers in early factories and mines. Children had been an important...