Industrial Revolution

Millionaires in the Making

In the year after ‘Mr. Madison’s War’, writes W.I. Cunningham, three Massachusetts businessmen helped to transfer the Industrial Revolution from England to America.

Sex and the Industrial Revolution

Two centuries before the Swinging Sixties the weakening of social customs caused by the Industrial Revolution led to a modest transformation in people’s sexual behaviour, says Emma Griffin.

Fractious Waters

The controversy over fracking finds echoes in 19th-century concerns over groundwater.

Builders of Trans-Siberian Railway

The first sod of the longest railway on earth was turned by the last of the Tsars in 1891; Hilda Hookham describes an epic process of construction, with the line finally completed in 1904.

Wood and Coal : A Change of Fuel

Alan D. Dyer describes how Britain’s industrial development began when coal replaced wood during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.

George Smith of Coalville

During the Victorian Age, writes Courtney Dainton, when many social reformers came from the upper classes, Smith was a philanthropist who had himself experienced the hardships of the very poor.

The Miraculous Machine

Derek W. Lawrence portrays 1769 as a fateful year for the world: Napoleon and Wellington were both born in it; and James Watt took out a patent for his momentous steam-engine.