Editing Eli Whitney (section)

==Career==
Whitney is most famous for two innovations which came to have significant impacts on the United States in the mid-19th century: the cotton gin (1793) and his advocacy of [[interchangeable parts]]. In the South, the cotton gin revolutionized the way cotton was [[harvest]]ed and reinvigorated slavery. Conversely, in the North the adoption of interchangeable parts revolutionized the manufacturing industry, contributing greatly to the U.S. victory in the [[American Civil War|Civil War]].<ref>[http://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/nge/Article.jsp?id=h-3497 New Georgia Encyclopedia: Eli Whitney in Georgia] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130405160012/http://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/nge/Article.jsp?id=h-3497 |date=April 5, 2013 }}. Accessed March 19, 2008.</ref>

===Cotton gin===
{{main|Cotton gin}}
[[File:Cotton gin harpers.jpg|thumb|"First cotton gin" from Harpers Weekly. 1869 illustration depicting event of some 70 years earlier.]]
[[File:Whitney Gin.jpg|right|thumb|Cotton Gin Patent. It shows sawtooth gin blades, which were not part of Whitney's original patent.]]
[[File:Cotton gin EWM 2007.jpg|thumb|right|A cotton gin on display at the [[Eli Whitney Museum]]]]

The cotton gin is a mechanical device that removes the seeds from cotton, a process that had previously been extremely labor-intensive. The word ''gin'' is short for ''engine.'' While staying at Mulberry Grove, Whitney constructed several ingenious household devices which led Mrs Greene to introduce him to some businessmen who were discussing the desirability of a machine to
separate the short staple upland cotton from its seeds, work that was then done by hand at the rate of a pound of lint a day. In a few weeks Whitney produced a model.{{sfn|Chisholm|1911}} The cotton gin was a wooden drum stuck with hooks that pulled the cotton fibers through a mesh. The cotton seeds would not fit through the mesh and fell outside. Whitney occasionally told a story wherein he was pondering an improved method of seeding the cotton when he was inspired by observing a cat attempting to pull a chicken through a fence, and able to only pull through some of the feathers.<ref>{{Cite news |date=April 27, 1918 |title=Cat Gave Him Idea. |work=Gettysburg Compiler |url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=2246&dat=19180427&id=5PclAAAAIBAJ&pg=7052,6418392 |access-date=2018-10-30 |via=Google News Archive Search}}</ref>

A single cotton gin could generate up to {{convert|55|lb}} of cleaned cotton daily. This contributed to the economic development of the [[Southern United States]], a prime cotton growing area; some historians believe that this invention allowed for the [[Slavery in the United States|African slavery system]] in the Southern United States to become more sustainable at a critical point in its development.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.archives.gov/education/lessons/cotton-gin-patent|title=Eli Whitney's Patent for the Cotton Gin|date=August 15, 2016|access-date=13 April 2021|publisher= US National Archives}}{{Better ref needed|date=September 2024}}</ref>

Whitney applied for the patent for his cotton gin on October 28, 1793, and received the patent (later numbered as X72) on March 14, 1794,<ref>{{cite web|title=Patent for Cotton Gin|url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=khh&AN=64084521&site=eds-live&scope=site|website=History Reference Center|access-date=20 October 2016}}</ref> but it was not validated until 1807. Whitney and his partner, Miller, did not intend to sell the gins. Rather, like the proprietors of [[gristmill]]s and [[sawmill]]s, they expected to charge farmers for cleaning their cotton – two-fifths of the value, paid in cotton. Resentment at this scheme, the mechanical simplicity of the device and the primitive state of [[History of patent law|patent law]], made [[Patent infringement|infringement]] inevitable. Whitney and Miller could not build enough gins to meet demand, so gins from other makers found ready sale. Ultimately, patent infringement lawsuits consumed the profits (one patent, later annulled, was granted in 1796 to Hogden Holmes for a gin which substituted circular saws for the spikes){{sfn|Chisholm|1911}} and their cotton gin company went out of business in 1797.<ref name="MIT" /> One oft-overlooked point is that there were drawbacks to Whitney's first design.{{Clarify|date=September 2024}}   There are claims that the use of wires rather than pegs was proposed by Mrs. Greene, but these are disputed.<ref name=MIT>{{cite web |title = Inventor of the Week: Eli Whitney - Cotton Gin |url=http://web.mit.edu/invent/iow/whitney.html |date=9 June 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120609154415/http://web.mit.edu/invent/iow/whitney.html |archive-date=June 9, 2012 }}</ref>

After validation of the patent, the legislature of South Carolina voted $50,000 for the rights for that state, while North Carolina levied a license tax for five years, from which about $30,000 was realized. There is a claim that Tennessee paid about $10,000.{{sfn|Chisholm|1911}}

While the cotton gin did not earn Whitney the fortune he had hoped for, it did give him fame. It has been argued by some historians that Whitney's cotton gin was an important if unintended cause of the American Civil War. After Whitney's invention, the [[Plantations in the American South|plantation slavery]] industry was rejuvenated, eventually culminating in the Civil War.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://americanhistory.about.com/od/civilwarmenu/a/cause_civil_war.htm |title=Top Five Causes of the Civil War |publisher=Americanhistory.about.com |date=2012-01-26 |access-date=2012-03-14 |archive-date=August 22, 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110822024553/http://americanhistory.about.com/od/civilwarmenu/a/cause_civil_war.htm |url-status=dead }}</ref>

The cotton gin transformed Southern agriculture and the national economy.<ref name=EWmuseum>[http://www.eliwhitney.org/ The Eli Whitney Museum and Workshop], a website for The Eli Whitney Museum in [[Hamden, Connecticut|Hamden]], Connecticut</ref> Southern cotton found ready markets in Europe and in the burgeoning [[cotton mill|textile mill]]s of [[New England]].  Cotton exports from the U.S. boomed after the cotton gin's appearance – from less than {{convert|500000|lb}} in 1793 to {{convert|93|e6lb|kg}} by 1810.<ref>{{Cite journal
  | journal = Monthly Summary of Commerce and Finance
  | title = Monthly Summary of Commerce and Finance of the United States, Issues 1-3
  | volume = 1895–1896
  | page = 290
  | publisher = U.S. Department of the Treasury
 }}</ref> Cotton was a staple that could be stored for long periods and shipped long distances, unlike most agricultural products. It became the U.S.'s chief export, representing over half the value of U.S. exports from 1820 to 1860.

Before the 1790s, slave labor was primarily employed in growing rice, tobacco, and [[Indigofera tinctoria|indigo]], none of which were especially profitable anymore. Neither was cotton, due to the difficulty of seed removal. But with the invention of the gin, growing cotton with slave labor became highly profitable – the chief source of wealth in the American South, and the basis of frontier settlement from [[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]] to Texas. "[[King Cotton]]" became a dominant economic force, and slavery was sustained as a key institution of Southern society.

===Interchangeable parts===
{{more citations needed|section|date=December 2019}}
{{main|Interchangeable parts}}
[[File:Eli Whitney's first contract as a gunfounder signed by Oliver Ellsworth 1786.jpg|thumb|upright|First contract of Eli Whitney as a firearms manufacturer, 1798. Signed by [[Oliver Wolcott Jr.]], [[Secretary of the Treasury]].]]
Eli Whitney has often been incorrectly credited with inventing the idea of interchangeable parts, which he championed for years as a maker of [[musket]]s; however, the idea predated Whitney, and Whitney's role in it was one of promotion and popularizing, not invention.<ref name="Bryson">{{cite book|last1=Bryson|first1=Bill|title=At Home: A Short History of Private Life|date=2011|publisher=Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group|isbn=9780767919395|page=[https://archive.org/details/athomeshorthisto00bill/page/412 412]|url-access=registration|url=https://archive.org/details/athomeshorthisto00bill/page/412}}</ref> Successful implementation of the idea eluded Whitney until near the end of his life, occurring first in others' armories.

Attempts at interchangeability of parts can be traced back as far as the [[Punic Wars]] through both archaeological remains of boats now in Museo Archeologico Baglio Anselmi and contemporary written accounts.{{Citation needed|date=January 2011}} In modern times the idea developed over decades among many people. An early leader was [[Jean-Baptiste Vaquette de Gribeauval]], an 18th-century French [[artillery|artillerist]] who created a fair amount of [[standardization]] of artillery pieces, although not true interchangeability of parts. He inspired others, including [[Honoré Blanc]] and [[Louis de Tousard]], to work further on the idea, and on shoulder weapons as well as artillery. In the 19th century these efforts produced the "armory system," or [[American system of manufacturing]]. Certain other New Englanders, including [[Captain John H. Hall]] and [[Simeon North]], arrived at successful interchangeability before Whitney's armory did. The Whitney armory finally succeeded not long after his death in 1825.

The motives behind Whitney's acceptance of a contract to manufacture muskets in 1798 were mostly monetary. By the late 1790s, Whitney was on the verge of bankruptcy and the cotton gin litigation had left him deeply in [[debt]]. His [[New Haven]] cotton gin factory had burned to the ground, and litigation sapped his remaining resources. The [[French Revolution]] had ignited new conflicts between Great Britain, France, and the United States. The new American government, realizing the need to prepare for war, began to rearm. The [[United States Department of War|War Department]] issued contracts for the manufacture of 10,000 muskets. Whitney, who had never made a gun in his life, obtained a contract in January 1798 to deliver 10,000 to 15,000 muskets in 1800. He had not mentioned interchangeable parts at that time.  Ten months later, the Treasury Secretary, [[Oliver Wolcott Jr.]], sent him a "foreign pamphlet on arms manufacturing techniques," possibly one of Honoré Blanc's reports, after which Whitney first began to talk about interchangeability.

[[File:Eli Whitney Gun Factory William Giles Munson 1827.jpg|thumb|250px|Whitney's gun factory in 1827]]
In May 1798, Congress voted for legislation that would use 800,000 dollars  in order to pay for small arms and cannons in case war with France erupted. It offered a 5,000 dollar incentive with an additional 5,000 dollars once that money was exhausted for the person that was able to accurately produce arms for the government. Because the cotton gin had not brought Whitney the rewards he believed it promised, he accepted the offer. Although the contract was for one year, Whitney did not deliver the arms until 1809, using multiple excuses for the delay. Recently, historians have found that during 1801–1806, Whitney took the money and headed into South Carolina in order to profit from the cotton gin.<ref name="Baida1987"/>

Although Whitney's demonstration of 1801 appeared to show the feasibility of creating interchangeable parts, [[Merritt Roe Smith]] concludes that it was "staged" and "duped government authorities" into believing that he had been successful. The charade gained him time and resources toward achieving that goal.<ref name="Baida1987"/>

When the government complained that Whitney's price per musket compared unfavorably with those produced in government armories, he was able to calculate an actual price per musket by including [[fixed cost]]s such as insurance and [[machinery]], which the government had not accounted for. He thus made early contributions to both the concepts of [[cost accounting]], and [[efficiency (economics)|economic efficiency]] in manufacturing.

===Milling machine===
{{Detail|Milling (machining)}}
Machine tool historian Joseph W. Roe credited Whitney with inventing the first [[milling machine]] circa 1818. Subsequent work by other historians (Woodbury; Smith; Muir; Battison [cited by Baida<ref name="Baida1987">{{Cite journal | last = Baida | first = Peter |date=May–June 1987 | title = Eli Whitney's Other Talent | journal = American Heritage | volume = 38 | issue = 4 | url = http://www.americanheritage.com/content/eli-whitney%E2%80%99s-other-talent?page=show | access-date =May 30, 2013 }}</ref>]) suggests that Whitney was among a group of contemporaries all developing milling machines at about the same time (1814 to 1818), and that the others were more important to the innovation than Whitney was. (The machine that excited Roe may not have been built until 1825, after Whitney's death.) Therefore, no one person can properly be described as the inventor of the milling machine.