TIME

Industrial Revolution

c. 1760–1840

Night painting of the Coalbrookdale ironworks, with furnaces throwing orange flame and smoke across the sky above a Shropshire valley.

Recorded HistoryIndustrial Revolution

From hand work to machines.

The Industrial Revolution was the shift from hand work to machines, factories and coal-fired power, beginning in Britain in the later 1700s.

Mechanized spinning, Watt’s steam engine and coke-smelted iron led the way. The period runs from about 1760 to 1840.

c. 1760–1840, placed on the scale of its era on a line leading toward now.

Era
Recorded History
Period
c. 1760–1840
Edition
1/1
Status
Not Released
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Background artwork

Philip James de Loutherbourg, Coalbrookdale by Night, oil on canvas, 1801. Science Museum Group, London. Public domain. A painting made during the period, not a photograph.