Industrial Revolution: Did you mean...?

An 1870 print by Gustave Doré (1832-83) showing the cramped housing of London which followed the great urbanisation of the British Industrial Revolution.

The Rocket locomotive steam engine was designed in 1829 by Robert Stephenson (1803-1859) during the Industrial Revolution. The locomotive won the 1829 Rainhill Trials and so was used to pull passenger carriages on the world's first intercity...

A model of a spinning jenny. The machine was invented in Lancashire in 1765 by James Hargreaves (1720-1778). The machine ('jenny') was capable of spinning multiple threads simultaneously and was one of the first important inventions in the...

The Difference Engine was invented by the Englishman Charles Babbage (1791-1871) in 1822. This example is a modern model of Babbage's Mark II, designed c. 1848. Like most other inventions of the Industrial Revolution, Babbage built on the...

A cotton gin (machine), invented by Eli Whitney (1765-1825) in the United States in 1794 during the Industrial Revolution. The machine was used to clean raw cotton and separate it from sticky seeds by pulling the cotton balls through a comb...

The milling machine was once thought to have been invented by Eli Whitney (already famous for his cotton gin) c. 1818, but as with many other inventions of the Industrial Revolution, the truth may be more complex regarding who invented what...

As with many inventions during the Industrial Revolution, the papermaking machine was something of a collaborative affair. This model is of one of the early machines developed by the Frenchman Nicholas Louis Robert (1761-1828) in 1799. The...

An 1834 oil on canvas portrait by William Henry Brooke (1772-1860) of the industrialist Robert Owen (1771-1858) who rose from the position of a lowly apprentice to become a great mill owner during the Industrial Revolution. (National Portrait...

A portrait bust of the Scottish engineer and inventor James Watt (1736-1819). Watt, with his partner Matthew Boulton (1728-1809), made significant developments to the design of steam engines during the Industrial Revolution. Sculpted by P...

An 1857 photograph by Robert Howlett of the engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel (1806-1859), one of the key figures of the Industrial Revolution in Britain. Brunel is standing in front of the restraining chains used in the launch of his giant...