Annotated Bibliography
Primary Sources
Eli Whitney, Jr. to his Father, 11 September 1793. Eli Whitney Papers, Manuscripts
and Archives, Yale University Library.
In Eli Whitney’s letter to his parent, he includes a firsthand account of the
seven months that he spent in Georgia. He describes the problem with cotton
growing that led him to the invention of his cotton gin. It also illustrates a
business deal that he entered which allowed him to start producing cotton gins
even though he was low on money and the trouble Eli Whitney went through
to get a patent. This is a primary source written by the man who made it and
intended for private audience.
Hammond, James. Selections from the Letters and Speeches of the Hon. James H.
Hammond, of South Carolina. New York: John F. Trow and Co., 1866.
James Hammond's book has a variety of primary sources about his beliefs.
The specific speech researched is commonly called “Cotton is King” and I
found an excerpt online as well as the full speech in Encarta. “Cotton is King”
is opinionated in the sense that Hammond was a slave owning southerner. On
the other hand, it describes that cotton rules and delves into the issues of
slave labor. Although his thoughts clearly separate the North from the South
and voice the need of slavery, he talks about the economic prosperity of it.
The speech is not written on the cotton gin specifically, but it is because of
the cotton gin that “cotton is king.” This was presented during the civil war,
showing that cotton was beneficial years after the cotton gin, and that it
created conflict.
Introduction. Cotton Is King and Pro-Slavery Arguments. Comp. E. N. Elliott. Agusta,
GA:Pritchard, Abbott and Loomis, 1960. N5-N19. Print.
A newspaper article from the 1860s, this primary source includes an argument
in favor of slavery. It refers to a slave, not in the way that an abolitionist
would use it, but rather in the sense that a slave is an object that people can
buy and sell. It even uses one doctor’s conclusion that the African race is
uncivilized because of their evolution and uses this as a reason for why slaves
should not be emancipated. This helps me understand how anyone would ever
be able to believe that another human is inferior because when I think of a
doctor, I just assume that they are correct.
Schur, Joan. Teaching With Documents: Eli Whitney’s Patent for the Cotton Gin. The
National Archives. April 11, 2010. <
http://archives.gov/education/lessons/cotton-gin-patent>.
Eli Whitney's Patent for the Cotton Gin article on the National Archives
website goes into more depth about the process Eli Whitney had to go
through when he was trying to make money off his new invention. It also
illustrates how the cotton gin had good effects on America and bad ones.
For example, one major down fall caused by this invention is the increase
of the number of slaves. From this paper, I was able to understand the
connection between the Industrial Revolution in the north and the increase
of cotton production in the south. Because of this relationship, it was hard
for the north to still reject slavery since it made their products cheaper and
more competitive. This is a reliable source because it is on a government
website.
"Value of the Cotton Crop Compared with the Total Productions of the Country." New
York Times. 15 Dec. 1860. Value of the Cotton Crop Compared with the Total
Productions of the Country. Web. 8 May 2010.
<http://www.nytimes.com/1860/12/15/news/value-of-the-cotton-crop-
compared-with-the-total-productions-of-the-country.html?pagewanted=3>
The article makes the statement that Massachusetts alone contributes more to
the economy of the United States than the South. This goes against many
other sources we have found. But when looking deeper into the article, and
specifically on the profits for cotton, the North (from prior knowledge) receives
the cotton from the South. Without the South, Massachusetts may not be
more prosperous than the South. This article may be bias, but it indirectly
shows that the North is wealthy in part by the South.
Young, Hugh. “Cotton and Cottondon.” The Tioga County Agitator. March 11, 1861:
The Agitator.
Hugh Young is actually the editor of the newspaper, and is cited because the
authors name is illegible. In one sentence, the author states he is a “Yankee”
and after searching the term, I found that to be a term used for a New
Englander, although the newspaper is from Pennsylvania. This article struck
me after finding this out, because he does not seem against slave labor,
although from the North. In the article, he uses rhetorical questions. He asks,
“You have crushed out the genius of Whitney, because he has made cotton
raising and consequently, slave raising, profitable?” He goes into the economic
value of cotton and how “the whole face of affairs was changed at the South.”
This article is from a citizen, and is written during the Civil War. This shows
one reaction, many years after the gin was invented, and does not fit into the
generalization of the emancipation hungry North.
Secondary Sources
Bates, Edward C. "Story of the Cotton Gin." The New England Magazine 0008.3
(1890): 286-93. Web. 1 May 2010.
An article on the effects of the cotton gin, written in 1890, it provides an
insight into how the next generation viewed the cotton gin. Because it was
written right after the Civil War, the article also talks about the importance of
cotton from that era. The most important detail is that it confirmed what I was
already drawing a conclusion toward, that the cotton gin was a cause of the
civil war. In his article, Bates argues that the need for cotton pushed people
to forget their moral values to make a profit, thus influencing the growth of
slavery. The New England Magazine was a journal published in Boston in the
1800 and 1900’s.
Chaplin, Joyce. “Cotton”. 1996-2010. History.com. April 25,
2010. http://www.history.com/topics/cotton.
The web page goes over the history of cotton; it talks about the slavery
problems and expansion. Because of expansion, according to the site, the
South would want slave states created. It even makes a point about after
slavery being abolished, and the reform that took place: “new forms of
servitude- tenantry and sharecropping”. The article ties to our thesis because
it shows the general ideas and problems between the North and South and is
not bias. There are sources at the bottom of the page that show reliability
and the opportunity to use them. In addition, the author is a Harvard
Early American History professor.
Eli Whitney and the Cotton Gin. Web. 11 Apr. 2010.
A website made by MIT, it goes into detail on the story of how Eli Whitney
invented the cotton gin. This website tells how Eli Whitney went down from
the North, was told by southern planters that a new machine was needed,
and built the machine over the winter. It also went into the fact that Whitney
tried different models, the first not working as well as desired. According to
the article, he changed his models to come up with a better one. There is no
author stated, but it is from an MIT website.
Eli Whitney's Cotton Gin. Web. 11 Apr. 2010.
It is a short article from the national archives telling the story of how Eli
Whitney invented the cotton gin. This article is a reliable source, being that it
is from the national archives. The article helped make the effects of the cotton
gin more clear, because it talked about the growth in the number of slaves.
This would be the reaction part, because the cotton gin allowed more cotton to
be grown, causing the need for slave labor to go up, as well.
Eli Whitney and the Need for an Invention. Publication. Eli Whitney Museum. Web. 2
May 2010. <http://www.archives.gov/education/lessons/cotton-gin-
patent/images/patent-drawing.jpg>.
Eli Whitney and the Need for an Invention is a great web page that has a good
list of effects of the cotton gin, describes the actual machine, and the path it
takes after Eli Whitney designs the cotton gin. This piece of writing also
discusses the patent problems he has and what the specific laws have to do
with patents. While Eli Whitney was hoping to bring in great profit from his
invention but issues he had with patent laws made this very difficult. This
publication also agrees with the widespread idea that the cotton gin
increased slavery.
Evans, Harold. They Made America. New York: Little, Brown, 2004. 48-52.
Being a reliable source from a reliable author, the passage is short, but goes
over how the cotton gin revolutionized both the North and the South. He uses
numbers to describe the sudden increase of slaves, but mainly describes the
problems with the cotton gin patenting (which is one reaction to the
invention). The back has an extensive bibliography and a short list for the
chapter on Whitney.
Farrow, Anne. Lang, Joel. Frank, Jenifer. Complicity. New York: Ballantine Books,
2005.
This book talks about the gains and troubles from slavery in the North.
Complicity has a chapter dedicated to cotton in the North, and the talk of
New York breaking away from the United States. This is a prime example of
a city that is economically hungry. They relied on the South for there wealth,
and if the South left, New York city would not get the cotton from them.
Cotton created conflict, and it was because of the gin that the conflict was so
large. The South used slaves to get the large amounts of cotton, whilst the
North used the cotton in the mills and to sell. The book goes over how even
Massachusetts needed the South. This book is helpful towards our thesis,
because the North indirectly needed slave labor for the cotton. The book
shows reliability through notes as well as a bibliography. The notes and
bibliography show the authors used both primary and secondary sources.
Foner, Eric. A Short History on Reconstruction. New York City: Harper and Row, 1990.
Print.
A book written by Eric Foner on the Reconstruction era, it provides an insight
into the new labor systems emerging after the abolition of slavery. Foner
articulates many of the problems regarding the sharecropping system, such as
neither plantation owner nor sharecropper trusted the other. As Foner
says, this new system is "a compromise not fully satisfactory to either party."
However, the former slave was happy with the new autonomy and
independence gained from this arrangement. This source is reliable because it
was written by the leading historian of the Reconstruction Era.
Garrison, Ritchie. Inventing the Cotton Gin: Machine and Myth in Antebellum
America. 2 Jan. 2005. ELibrary. Web. 25 Apr. 2010.
<http://elibrary.bigchalk.com/>.
The focal point of the scholarly journal, Inventing the Cotton Gin: Machine
and Myth in Antebellum America, is how it increased slavery in the north and
sped up the industrialization in the North. This piece of writing also discusses
how some people rejected the cotton gin because they thought it neglected
the quality concerns since it was too centered on the amount made. It also
acknowledges the fact that Eli Whitney is not the first or last person to work
with the inventing of the cotton gin. The author is a professor at the
University of Delaware and has written numerous books that received multiple
awards.
Greenwood, Janette T. "The New South." Elibrary. Proquest, 1 Dec. 2001. Web. 9 May
2010.
A long article about the south after the Civil War, this article provides an
insight about the new system of labor that emerged. After Lincoln issued the
Emancipation Proclamation, slaves were no longer slaves. This meant, among
other things, that these former slaves were now able to earn wages. Because
slaves did not have much money, they could not buy land or the tools
necessary to farm. The new labor system, sharecropping, meant that
plantation owners could loan out land, tools, and seed to the former slaves,
let them do the work, and require half of the crop as payment. This article
expands on this concept, explaining how the system went in favor of the
plantation owners. This source is useful in focusing on the reform, because
the cotton gin caused a rise in slavery, helping to cause the Civil War, and
this is the reform.
Inventor of the Week. August 2009. LEMELSON-MIT PROGRAM. April 11, 2010. <http://web.mit.edu/invent/iow/whitney.html>.
The Inventor of the week for the Lemelson-MIT program webpage focuses on
Eli Whitney rather than the cotton gin. This is helpful in identifying some of
the problems that Eli Whitney comes across because he created the cotton
gin. Because this document was on a website by MIT, I believe it is reliable.
It also identifies some of the other major contributions Eli Whitney makes to
American society. MIT is a well-known college and they have a reputation to
hold up, so this is most likely a reliable source.
Johnson Paul. The Birth of the Modern World Society 1815-1830. New York:
HarperCollins Publishers, 1991. 308-313.
The novel not only explains the revolution of the cotton gin, but it explains
extensively about the effects on the slaves, the importance to the economy,
and the “migration.” The author states, “Some Southerners began openly to
defend slavery as an institution.” Slavery in the South is a part of life and is
needed for the cotton industry. To compromise this and create a reform will
be difficult. It is hard to get rid of an “institution.” This book is reliable, for
the back of the book holds hundreds of notes, showing the extensive research
done.
Lakwete, Angela. Inventing the Cotton Gin. Baltimore: The John Hopkins University
Press, 2003.
The author not only writes about Eli Whitney and his cotton gin, but cotton
gins throughout history. America thinks of Eli Whitney as the inventor of the
cotton gin, although the history behind it is much more complex. She uses
countless sources, both primary and secondary to go through the history of
gins and includes pictures from old posters and magazines. The book speaks
of the cotton gin socially, and how people think of the Civil War and slavery
when the word cotton gin comes up: the cotton gin has become a term
relative to wealth as well as war. This relates to our thesis because the
invention not only revolutionized the South, but it put a bad mark
on the South's history. It also initiates that Eli Whitney didn't revolutionize by
creating “the first but a new type of gin.”
Meltzer, Milton. The Cotton Gin. New York: Benchmark, 2004. Print.
A short book on the cotton gin, it provides a snapshot of the time before
the cotton gin was invented. This is useful because now we can compare the
level of slave labor from before and after the cotton gin was invented. It also
provides some information on the revitalization of slave labor after the cotton
gin was invented. After focusing on the actual invention of the cotton gin, we
can now turn to how slave labor was affected by the invention. It is a reliable
source, with good pictures and no reason to distort.
Regan A. Eli Whitney The Cotton Gin and American Manufacturing. New York: Rosen
Group, 2004. Print.
Eli Whitney: The Cotton Gin and American Manufacturing includes the whole
story. It is about Eli Whitney, but it also has one chapter that is all about the
cotton gin. This book also has a lot of primary sources including a news paper
article from March 1, 1794 and a letter from Thomas Jefferson to Eli Whitney.
After clearly describing the problem that caused Whitney to invent the gin, it
goes into depth about the effects of this innovation other than the increase in
slavery. Phineas Miller, the man who partnered with Whitney and made the
creation of the cotton gin possible with his investment, is also described well.
Rubin, Julian. The Invention of the Cotton Gin. Copyright 2003-2009. Following the
Path of Discovery. April 11, we
<www.juliantrubin.com/bigten/whitneycottongin.html>.
Following the Path of Discovery Repeat Famous Experiments and Inventions
was a great website that focused on the basics of how the machine worked. It
continued to explain how that affects the economy of the entire United
States. It helped me see the machine more realistically and understand
what a big difference it made to the speed of production. This is a reliable
source because it cited many sources that I was able to look at. In general, it
also seemed to agree with all of the other articles I have read.
Snider, Arthur J. "From Cotton Gin to Satellite." The Rotarian Mar. 1962: 24-26. Web.
2 May 2010.
An article from a history magazine, published in 1962, it focuses on what the
invention of the cotton gin started. It talked mostly of how the cotton gin
caused other mechanical minds to come up with solutions to the hard labor
that required slaves. What this article is saying is that the invention of the
cotton gin led to the industrial revolution. This article provides a clearer
picture of the reaction and reform parts of the theme.
Stampp, Kenneth M. The Peculiar Institution. New York City: Alfred A Knopf, 1956.
Print.
This book, written around the time of the Civil Rights movement, is
written entirely on the issues of slavery. It provides a better understanding of
how slavery manifested itself in the south before the Civil War. It is useful
to our project because Stampp explains the dependence upon slave labor in
the production of short staple cotton in the south. This book also provides a
clear description of the effort Southerners made to convince themselves that
slavery was morally right in order to make a profit.
West, Jean. “King Cotton: The Fiber of Slavery”. Slaveryinamerica.org. April 25, 2010. <http://www.slaveryinamerica.org/history/hs_es_cotton.htm>
Although it is an essay from a social studies consultant (not a historian), she
used a variety of sources (books and websites.) The essay speaks of the
revolution of cotton and King Cotton and goes into the reason the cotton gin
was so important and useful to the South. In addition, it connects cotton to
slavery. A chart on the site shows the South's slave population in 1790 to be
654,121 and 3,950,511 in 1860, which is a huge increase. In addition,
according to the essay, the cotton industry was 57% of America's exports in
1860. The North will have a much harder time getting rid of slavery when the
number has increased so dramatically as well as cotton being a huge portion
of America's economy.
Woods, Robert O. "A turn of the crank started the civil war: the cotton gin
was a simplemechanism by today's standards, but its influence divided and
then united a nation."Mechanical Engineering- CIME 131.9 (2009): 54+.
General OneFile. Web. 11 Apr. 2010.
An article found on a database, we found that it is consistent with other
sources and is a secondary source. It talks about how the cotton gin invention
caused the civil war, and goes into details of how. It provides clear reactions
to the invention, and as the Civil War is a reform movement, it also provides
a clear reform. The article is written by an engineer, so he may distort, but it
is easily avoided, and because the information is consistent with others, we
will be able to avoid it and will provide useful information.