of the sewing machine.

Great Britain was determined to keep to herself the industrial
secrets she had gained. According to the economic beliefs of the
eighteenth century, which gave place but slowly to the doctrines
of Adam Smith, monopoly rather than cheap production was the road
to success. The laws therefore forbade the export of English
machinery or drawings and specifications by which machines might
be constructed in other countries. Some men saw a vast prosperity
for Great Britain, if only the mystery might be preserved.

Meanwhile the stories of what these machines could do excited
envy in other countries, where men desired to share in the
industrial gains. And, even before Eli Whitney's cotton gin came
to provide an abundant supply of raw material, some Americans
were struggling to improve the old hand loom, found in every
house, and to make some sort of a spinning machine to replace the
spinning wheel by which one thread at a time was laboriously
spun.

East Bridgewater, Massachusetts, was the scene of one of the
earliest of these experiments. There in 1786 two Scotchmen, who
claimed to understand Arkwright's mechanism, were employed to
make spinning machines, and about the same time another attempt
was made at Beverly. In both instances the experiments were
encouraged by the State and assisted with grants of money. The
machines, operated by horse power, were crude, and the product
was irregular and unsatisfactory. Then three men at Providence,
Rhode Island, using drawings of the Beverly machinery, made
machines having thirty-two spindles which worked indifferently.