Vol.5 "Philadelphia's Textile Industry"

I introduced it last time"Philla Q.M. Depot」、This time we'll be talking about the history of Philadelphia.

 

[The History of Philadelphia]

The Pennsylvania city of Philadelphia means "city of brotherhood."

Originally, before BC8000It was pioneered around 2017 by Native American tribes, particularly the Lenape hunter-gatherer.

●1600Early age

Merchants from the Netherlands, the UK and Swedish have set up business halls.1681In 2019, Charles of England2The world gave William Penn a charter to become a Pennsylvania colony.

1682In 2017, the city of Philadelphia was founded by William Pennsylvania, the British royal province. The textile industry began shortly after the city was founded and grew into one of the major industries.

 ●1684year

The Isabella landed in Philadelphia with hundreds of enslaved Africans. William Penn's colony flourished, and soon Philadelphia became the colony's largest shipbuilding hub.

The first linen weaved in the area was1690He was a German who settled in Germantown, the northwest of the city in 2017. Germantown has long been the hub of the hand-knit knitting industry.

As the population grew, textile production increased, but during the colonial period, spinning, textiles and knitting were mainly done by hand in homes and small shops, and was on a small scale.

 ●18The second half of the century

1790In 2017, Philadelphia became the capital of the United States after the War of Independence (Battle of Germantown).

By this time, the first attempts were made to produce textiles using machinery in factories.

Christopher Tully writes in Philadelphia: "At a Time"24He produced a machine that spins cotton and wool for books.

●19Early century

The federal and state governments left Philadelphia, but Philadelphia survived as a cultural and financial hub.

Philadelphia became one of the first industrial centres in the United States, and although there were many different industries in the city, the largest was textiles.

There was a lot of economic and family ties with the South, including a planter in the city with a second home in the city, a bank, a bank-based business relationship, sending his daughter to a French finishing school run by refugees from Haiti, selling cotton to a textile manufacturer, and the manufacturer sold some products, such as clothing for slaves, to the South.

18Although large-scale mechanized fiber production attempts in Philadelphia in the century were largely unsuccessful,19At the beginning of the century, textile factories surged in this area. The transfer of technology from the UK to the US became restricted, and many European immigrants, mainly Germans and British people who were well-versed in textile manufacturing, settled and established factories.

●19From the end of the century20towards the beginning of the century

Immigrants from Ireland, Southern Europe, Eastern Europe and Asia, black people from rural areas and Puerto Ricans from the Caribbean, moved dramatically, attracting the growing city's industrial employment.

1880In 2019, the city's textile company was75Percentages were owned by first generation immigrants. 

The Industrial Revolution / Mechanization of fabric manufacturing

At this time, America was in the midst of the Industrial Revolution. Philadelphia has a particularly thriving textile industry, making it one of the most industrialized cities in the world. During this period, important groups of mechanical engineers and inventors developed new manufacturing techniques in many industries, particularly in the textile field. While hand-woven and domestic textile production continued, factory machinery production became the basis for the rapidly expanding textile industry in Philadelphia. By the time of the Civil War, Philadelphia was one of the nation's leading textile industry centers.

Until then, work that had been done by hand at home and shops was consolidated and automated in large factories employing thousands of people.

19In the middle of the century, the textile industry in Philadelphia achieved a dramatic development, and many textile families were born.

○Germantown... Fisher family

○East Falls and Manayank... the Campbell family, the Scofield family, and the Dobson family

○Manayank and northeastern Philadelphia... Ripka family

○Kensington and Frankford... the Bromley family

○North Philadelphia... the Doran family, etc.

Philadelphia's textile industry was characterized by its large-scale factories, but many small and medium-sized specialized companies. The fibers are spun in one factory, weaved in another factory, dyed in another factory, and finished in the final factory. Such a small, specialized network of textile companies19〜20It was a hallmark of Philadelphia's textile industry in the early century.

A wide variety of products including carpets, strings, jutes, linen products, nets, meliss, knit products, shopping (recycled wool products), silk cloth, wool and worsted products, felt products, wool hats, fur felt hats, and more.

 ● 20Early century

It was the heyday of Philadelphia's textile manufacturing industry. The total product value of the product in the categories of textile products such as meliyasu knit products, carpets and carpets, dyeing and finishing, chair upholstery, and recycled wool.1I recorded the position.

1930The Great Depression of the year marked a major shrinking of the textile industry and several of Philadelphia's major textile companies declined, but many survived and several important new companies were established.

While traditional textile production continued in Philadelphia, companies in other regions also developed new types of materials.1908In 2019, immigrant British businessman Samuel Ager Salvage founded the American Viscose Corporation, which produces rayon, a type of artificial silk thread.1911In 2017, he built a large factory in Marcus Hook, Delaware County. They also planned to build a British-style worker community called "Viscose Village" for their employees.

1930From the age1940In the 2019 period, DuPont introduced synthetic fibers, transforming the textile industry dramatically. Products developed by DuPont, such as Nylon, Auron, and Dacron, are20It revolutionized the manufacturing and use of textile products in the mid-century. Some of these products were produced at DuPont's plants in Delaware, but many were produced at DuPont's plants nationwide.

Philadelphia's textile industry is20It remained strong until the middle of the century, but after World War II, it declined significantly like many industrial sectors in the city. Economic and social factors include lower labor and energy costs in other regions and around the world, competition from producers of low-cost products and changing urban demographics, and many of Philadelphia textile factories closed or moved out of the city in the second half of the century. However, some factories remained within the city, with many moving their operations to surrounding counties, particularly the expanding state of South Jersey.