Who Invented Cotton Gin

An article by Sam Reese    Comments Off

Cotton Gin was invented by Eli Whitney of Westbro; Massachusetts in the year 1793.He designed a cutting-edge machine which enabled automated separation of cotton fibres from the seeds. Prior to this invention cotton farming was a laborious and time-consuming process as the raw cotton fibres were manually picked from the seeds. Whitney’s cotton gin was able to produce 50 pounds of clean cotton in a day hence giving a great boost to the cotton producing sector.

Despite of having patented his design in 1794, Eli could not prevent the influx of cheap imitations in the market as his patent was not acknowledged in court till 1807.He struggled hard to make profits through his invention, but to no avail.

Eli Whitney, along with his business partner installed the cotton gins throughout Georgia and the southern states of America. They charged a cut of two-fifths of the farmer’s profit for the use of the cotton gin. However, farmers resented having to pay such an exorbitant tax for the machine and instead opted for the newer and less expensive versions of Eli’s design.

Although, Eli could not make much profit from his own design, the invention itself played a major role in fostering the expansion of the plantation industry in Southern states of America. By the end of 1860, United States South was contributing a total of two-thirds of the world’s cotton production.