The Industrial Revolution:  A Timeline

1692	Languedoc Canal connects the Mediterranean with the Bay of Biscay. 240 miles long, with 100 locks, 3 major aqueducts, 1 tunnel, and a summit reservoir.  The largest canal project between Roman times and the nineteenth century.
1708	Jethro Tull's mechanical (seed) sower permits large-scale planting in rows, for easier cultivation between the rows.
1709	Abraham Darby uses coke to smelt iron ore, replacing wood and charcoal as fuel.
1712	Thomas Newcomen builds first commercially successful steam engine. Able to keep deep coal mines clear of water. First significant power source other than wind and water.
1733	John Kay's flying shuttle.
1758	First threshing machine.
1761	James Brindley's Bridgewater Canal opens. Barges carry coal from Worsley to Manchester.
1765	James Hargreaves invents the spinning jenny, automating weaving the warp (in the weaving of cloth).
1769	Arkwright's "water" (powered) frame automates the weft.
1772	Bridgewater Canal extended to the Mersey, thus connecting with Liverpool. Its success kicks off extensive canal construction ("canal mania").
1775	Watt's first efficient steam engine, much more efficient than the Newcomen.
1777	Grand Trunk Canal establishes a cross-England route connecting the Mersey to the Trent and connecting the industrial Midlands to the ports of Bristol, Liverpool, and Hull.
1779	First steam powered mills. Crompton's "mule" combines Hargreaves' and Arkwright's machines, fully automating the weaving process.
1786	Arkwright puts a Watt engine in the Albion cotton mill, Blackfriars Bridge, London.
1787	Cartwright builds a power loom.
1789	Thames-Severn Canal links the Thames to the Bristol Channel.
1792	William Murdock (James Watt's assistant) lights his home with coal gas.
1793	Eli Whitney develops his cotton gin (a device to clean raw cotton).
1793- 1803	Thomas Telford builds his two great iron aqueducts, over the Dee and the Cierog valleys.
1801	Robert Trevithick demonstrates a steam locomotive.
1803-22	Caledonian Ship Canal cuts clear across Scotland via the Great Glen.
1807	Robert Fulton's Clermont first successful steamboat.
1811-15	Luddite riots: laborers attack factories and break up the machines they fear will replace them.
1821	Faraday demonstrates electro-magnetic rotation, the principle of the electric motor.
1825	Marc Brunel invents a tunneling shield, making sub aqueous tunneling possible.
1826-42	Brunel builds the first sub aqueous tunnel, under the Thames.
1827	Berkeley Ship Canal connects Sharpness (on the Severn) to Gloucester.
1830	Manchester–Liverpool railway begins first regular commercial rail service.
1831	Faraday discovers electro-magnetic current, making possible generators and electric engines.
1834	Charles Babbage develops his analytic engine--the forerunner of the computer.  Fox Talbot produces photographs.
1837	Morse develops the telegraph and Morse Code.  Great Western--first ocean-going steamship.
1838	Daguerre perfects the Daguerreotype.
1839	Fox Talbot introduces photographic paper.
1843	Great Britain--first large, iron, screw-propelled steamship.
1844	Commercial use of Morse's telegraph (Baltimore to Washington).
1846	Pneumatic tire patented First telegraph cable laid under the Channel.
1849	Monier develops reinforced concrete.
1850	Petrol (gasoline) refining first used.  Natural Science Honors School established at Oxford.
1851	Singer invents first practical sewing machine.  Natural Sciences Tripos at Cambridge.
1854	Bessemer invents steel converter.
1855	Regius Chair of Technology founded at Edinburgh.
1856	W.H. Perkin produces aniline dyes, permitting brightly colored cottons.
1857	Pasteur experiments with fermentation.
1858	First Trans-Atlantic Cable completed Cathode rays discovered.
1859	Charles Darwin, The Origin of Species.  Edwin Drake strikes oil in Pennsylvania.  Etienne Lenoir demonstrates the first successful gasoline engine.
1860	Science degrees at University of London.
1863	Siemens-Martin open hearth process (along with the Bessemer converter) makes steel available in bulk. Steel begins to replace iron in building: steel framing and reinforced concrete make possible "curtain-wall" architecture--i.e., the skyscraper.
1867	Alfred Nobel produces dynamite, the first high explosive which can be safely handled.
1873	Christopher Sholes invents the Remington typewriter.  James Clerk Maxwell states the laws of electro-magnetic radiation
1876	Bell invents the telephone.
1877	Edison invents the phonograph.
1878	Microphone invented.
1879	Edison invents the incandescent lamp.
1883	First skyscraper (ten stories) in Chicago.  The Brooklyn Bridge opens. This large suspension bridge, built by the Roeblings (father and son), is a triumph of engineering.
1884	Maxim invents the machine gun, making possible mass slaughter and beginning the mechanization of warfare.
1885	Benz develops first automobile to run on internal- combustion engine.
1888	Hertz produces radio waves.
1889	Eiffel Tower.
1892	Rudolf Diesel invents his namesake.
1895	Lumière brothers develop Cinematograph.  Roentgen discovers X-rays.
1896	Marconi patents wireless telegraph.
1897	Joseph Thomson discovers particles smaller than atoms.
1899	Aspirin invented.
1900	First Zeppelin built.
1901	Marconi transmits first trans-Atlantic radio message (from Cape Cod).
1903	Wright brothers make first powered flight.
1908	Henry Ford mass-produces the Model T.

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