Coal, Steam, and The Industrial Revolution: Crash Course World History #32

Mongols Shirts and Crash Course Posters! http://www.dftba.com/crashcourse

In which John Green wraps up revolutions month with what is arguably the most revolutionary of modern revolutions, the Industrial Revolution. While very few leaders were beheaded in the course of this one, it changed the lives of more people more dramatically than any of the political revolutions we've discussed. So, why did the Industrial Revolution happen around 1750 in the United Kingdom? Coal. Easily accessible coal, it turns out. All this, plus you'll finally learn the difference between James Watt and Thomas Newcomen, and will never again be caught telling people that your blender has a 900 Newcomen motor.

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Hi, I’m John Green;

this is Crash Course World History

and today we’re going to discuss
the series of events

that made it possible for you to watch

Crash Course.

And also made this studio possible.

And made the warehouse containing the studio
possible.

A warehouse, by the way,

that houses stuff for warehouses.

That’s right, it’s time to talk about

the industrial revolution.

Although it occurred around
the same time as

the French, American, Latin American,
and Haitian Revolutions—

between, say, 1750 and 1850—

the industrial revolution was really

the most revolutionary of the bunch.

No way, dude.

All those other revolutions resulted in,

like,

new borders and flags and stuff.

We’ve studied 15,000 years
of history here at Crash Course,

Me from the Past.

And borders and flags
have changed plenty,

and they’re going to keep changing.
[that's a twofer: awesome + ominous]

But in all that time,

nothing much changed about

the way we disposed of waste
[g'luck with toilet teching, Bill Gates!]

or located drinking water or
acquired clothing.

Most people lived on or very close
to the land that provided their food.

[like above an Eata Pita?]

Except for a few exceptions,

life expectancy never rose
above 35 or below 25.

Education was a privilege not a right.

In all those millennia,

we never developed a weapon

that could kill more than
a couple dozen people at once,

or a way to travel faster
than horseback.

For 15,000 years,

most humans never owned
or used a single item

made outside of their communities.

Simon Bolivar didn’t change that

and neither did the American
Declaration of Independence.

You have electricity?

Industrial revolution.

Blueberries in February?

Industrial revolution.

You live somewhere other
than a farm?

Industrial revolution.

You drive a car?

Industrial revolution.

You get twelve years of free,
formal education?

[peep the creepy teacher in the back]

Industrial revolution.

Your bed,

your antibiotics,

your toilet,

your contraception,

your tap water,

your every waking
and sleeping second:

[mongol-tage footage!]

Industrial revolution.

[Intro music]

[intro music]

[intro music]

[intro music]

[intro music]

[intro music]

[intro music]

Here’s one simple statistic
that sums it up:

Before the industrial revolution,

about 80% of the world’s population
was engaged in farming

to keep itself and the other
20% of people from starving.

Today, in the United States,

less than 1% of people
list their occupation as farming.

I mean,

we’ve come so far that we don’t
even have to farm flowers anymore.

Stan,

are these real, by the way?

I can’t tell if they’re made
out of foam or digital.

So what happened?

TECHNOLOGY!

Here’s my definition:

The industrial revolution was
an increase in production

brought about by the use of machines
[get ready to man-suit up, Skynet]

and characterized by
the use of new energy sources.

Although this will soon
get more complicated,

for our purposes today,

industrialization is NOT capitalism—

although, as we will see next week,

it is connected to modern capitalism.

And,

the industrial revolution
began around 1750 and

it occurred across most of the earth,

but it started in Europe,
especially Britain.

What happened?

Well, let’s go to the Thought Bubble.

The innovations of the
Industrial Revolution

were intimately interconnected.

Like,

look, for instance,
at the British textile industry:

The invention of the flying shuttle
by John Kay in 1733

dramatically increased the
speed of weaving,

which in turn
created demand for yarn,

which led to inventions like the Spinning
Jenny

and the waterframe.
[& later, Princess Leia bun sock hats]

Soon these processes were
mechanized using water power,

until the steam engine came along
to make flying shuttles really fly

in these huge cotton mills.

The most successful steam engine
was built by

Thomas “They Didn’t Name
Anything After Me” Newcomen

[is that Dutch?]

to clear water out of mines.

And because water was
cleared out of those mines,

there was more coal to
power more steam engines,

which eventually led to

the fancying up of the Newcomen
Steam Engine by

James “I Got a Unit of Power and
a University Named After Me” Watt,

[Farnsworth's raw deal tops, even still]

whose engine made possible not
only railroads and steamboats but

also ever-more efficient cotton mills.
[the touch, the feel… of technology]

And, for the first time,

chemicals other than stale urine,
[you must be kidding]

I wish I was kidding,

were being used to bleach
the cloth that people wore—

the first of which was sulfuric acid,
[sounds super chafey]

which was created in large quantities
only thanks to lead-lined chambers,

which would’ve been impossible
without lead production

rising dramatically right
around 1750 in Britain,

thanks to lead foundries
powered by coal.

And all these factors came together
to make more yarn

that could be spun and bleached
faster and cheaper than ever before,

a process that would eventually
culminate in

$18 Crash Course Mongols shirts.

[no exceptions!&$%# ] [ha]

Available now at DFTBA.com.

Thanks, Thought Bubble,

for that shameless promotion of our
beautiful, high-quality t-shirts available

now at DFTBA.com.
[TeamCrashCourse: lousy with subtlty]

So, the problem here

is that with industrialization
being so deeply interconnected,

it’s really difficult to figure out why
it happened in Europe,

especially Britain.

And that question of why

turns out to be one of
the more contentious discussions

in world history today.

For instance, here are some Eurocentric reasons

why industrialization might have
happened first in Europe:

There’s the cultural superiority
argument that basically holds

that Europeans are just better
and smarter than other people.

[somebody explain Mr. Bean then]

Sometimes this is formulated as Europeans
possessing

superior rationality.

By the way, you’ll never guess

where the people who make this
argument tend to come from—

unless you guessed that
they come from Europe.

And then, others argue

that only Europe had the culture of
science and invention

that made the creation of these
revolutionary technologies possible.

Another argument is that freer political
institutions encouraged innovation

and strong property rights
created incentives for inventors.

And, finally, people often cite
Europe’s small population

because small populations
require labor-saving inventions.

Oh,

it’s time for the Open Letter?

[it's not the yellow chair he's rolling
over to so I just can't bear to look.]

An Open Letter to the Steam Engine.

But first,

let’s see what’s in
the secret compartment today.

Oh, it’s a Tardis.
[you're welcome, Whovians]

Truly the apex of
British industrialization.

Dear Steam Engine,

You know what’s crazy?

You’ve really never been
improved upon.

Like this thing,

which facilitates time travel,

probably runs on a steam engine.
[Eye of Harmony > steam engine, ftr]

Almost all electricity around the world,

whether it’s from coal
or nuclear power,

is just a steam engine.

It’s all still just water and heat,

and it speaks to how truly revolutionary

the Industrial Revolution
was that since then,

it’s really just been evolution.

Best Wishes,
John Green

So, you may have heard any of
those rationales for

European industrialization,

or you may have heard others.

The problem with all of them,

is that each time you think
you’re at the root cause

it turns out there’s a cause
of the root cause.

[not unlike the show LOST]

To quote
Leonardo diCaprio, James Cameron,

and coal mine operators,

“We have to go deeper.”
["Context is everything." -John Green]

But, anyway, the problem
with these Eurocentric why answers,

is that they all apply to either
China or India or both.

And it’s really important
to note that in 1800,

it was not clear that Europe
was going to become

the world’s dominant manufacturing
power in the next hundred years.

At the time,

China, India, and Europe were
all roughly at the same place

in terms of industrial production.

First, let’s look at China.

It’s hard to make the European
cultural superiority argument

because China had been recording
its history since before Confucius,

and plus there was all that
bronze and painting and poetry.

It’s also kind of difficult to make a
blanket statement that

China was economically
inferior to Europe,

since they invented paper money

and led the world in exports of
everything from silk to china.

I mean, pre-Industrial Revolution,

population growth was the
surest sign of economic success,

and China had the
biggest population in the world.

[were my flowers just assaulted by educational
exuberance?]

I guess that answers the question
of whether they’re digital.

[better be in stock at thinkgeek.com, mr.
green. just saying...]

It’s also difficult to say that China
lacked a culture of invention

when they invented
gunpowder, and printing, and paper,

and arguably compasses.

And China had more free enterprise
during the Song dynasty

than anywhere in the world.

Some argue that China
couldn’t have free enterprise

because they had a long history
of trying to impose monopolies

on items like salt and iron.

And that’s true,

but when it comes to
enforcing those monopolies,

they also had a long history of failure.

So really, in a lot of ways,

China was at least as primed for an
Industrial Revolution as Britain was.

So, why didn’t it happen?

Well, Europeans—

specifically the British—

had two huge advantages:

First, Coal.

When you trace the story of improved
transportation, or communication,

or industrial efficiency,

or better chemical manufacturing,

it always comes back to coal,

because the Industrial Revolution
was all about using different forms

of energy to automate production.

And,

England had large supplies of coal
that were near the surface,

which meant that
it was cheap to mine,

so it quickly replaced wood
for heating and cooking and stuff.

So, that encouraged the British
to look for more coal.

The only problem with coal mining,

aside from it being,

you know, like,

deadly and everything,

is that the coal mines flooded
all the time.

I guess coal mining is also
a little problematic for, like,

the health of,

you know, like, the planet.

["Nudge, nudge, wink, wink.
Know what I mean?"]

But,

because there was all this incentive
to get more coal out of the ground,

steam engines were invented
to pump water out of the mines.

And because those early steam
engines were super inefficient,

they needed a cheap and abundant
source of fuel in order to work—

namely, coal,

which meant they were much more
useful to the British than anyone else.

So steam engines used cheap British
coal to keep British coal cheap,

and cheap British coal
created the opportunity

for everything from railroads to steel,

which like so much else in
the Industrial Revolution,

created a positive feedback loop.

Because they run on rails,
railroads need steel.

And because it is rather heavy,

steel needs railroads.

Secondly, there were Wages.

Britain (and to a lesser extent
the Low Countries)

had the highest wages in the world
at the beginning of the 18th century.

In 1725, wages in London were the equivalent
of 11 grams

of silver per day.

In Amsterdam, they were 9 grams.

In Beijing, Venice, and Florence,
they were under 4.

And in Delhi, they were under 2.

It’s not totally clear why
wages were so high in Britain.

Like,

one argument is that the Black Death
lowered population so much

that it tightened labor markets,

but that doesn’t explain why
wages remained low in, like,

plague-ravaged Italy.

Mainly, high wages combined
with cheap fuel costs meant

that it was economically efficient for
manufacturers to look to machines

as a way of lowering their
production costs.

To quote the historian Robert Allen:

“Wages were high and energy was cheap. These
prices led directly to the industrial revolution

by giving firms strong incentives to invent
technologies that substituted capital and

coal for labor.”

Stan,

I’m a little worried that people are still
going to accuse me of Eurocentrism.

Of course,

other people will accuse me
of an anti-European bias.

I don’t have a bias against Europe.

I love Europe.

Europe gave me many of
my favorite cheeses

and cross-country skiing

and Charlie Chaplin,

who inspired today’s Danica drawing.
[big ups, Modern Times. you endure]

Like, the fact of coal being
near the surface in Britain

can’t be chalked up to
British cultural superiority.

But the wages question is a little different
because

it makes it sound like only Europeans were
smart enough to pay high wages.

But here’s one last thing to consider:

India was the world’s largest
producer of cotton textiles,

despite paying basically
the lowest wages in the world.

Indian agriculture was so productive
that laborers could be supported

at a very low cost.

And that,
coupled with a large population

meant that Indian textile manufacturing

could be very productive
without using machines,

so they didn’t need to industrialize.

But more importantly from
our perspective,

there’s a strong argument to be made

that Indian cotton production
helped spur British industrialization.

It was cotton textiles that drove
the early Industrial Revolution,

and the main reason that Britain
was so eager to produce cottons

was that demand was incredibly high.

They were more comfortable than
woolens,

but they were also cheaper,

because cottons could be imported
from India at such a low cost.

So,

Indian cottons created the market

and then British manufacturers
invested in machines

(and imported Indian know-how)

to increase production so that
they could compete with India.

And that’s at least one way
in which European industrialization

was truly a world phenomenon.

For those of you who enjoy
such highly contentious and thorny,

cultural historical debates, good news.

Next week,

we’ll be talking about capitalism.

[can't wait to read the comments
section for that one. yes i can]

Thanks for watching, I’ll see you then.

Crash Course is

produced and directed
by Stan Muller.

Our script supervisor
is Danica Johnson.

The show is written by my
high school history teacher,

Raoul Meyer, and myself.

We are ably interned
by Meredith Danko.

And our graphics team is
Thought Bubble.

Last week’s phrase of the week was

"New England Revolution"

If you want to suggest
future phrases of the week,

you can do so in comments

where you can also guess
at this week’s phrase of the week

or ask questions about today’s video

that will be answered by
our team of historians.

Thanks for watching Crash Course.

Special shout out to our only known platinum-selling
artist viewer,

Lupe Fiasco.

And as we say in my hometown,

don’t forget My philosophy, like color
TV, is all there in black and white.