Historic Hallowell

Industrial Revolution - Hallowell Energy In the Mid/Late 1800’s

In the mid and late 1800’s, the basic energy for factories was steam engines. The steam engines were powered by coal. The funny thing is that as the years went by, the engines needed more coal. An example is that in 1852, the Corliss Steam engine that the cotton factory had needed 14 tons of coal per week. In 1878, 26 years later, it went from 14 to 30 tons per week. This might have been because they had more business, or it might’ve been because the machine changed. Another form of energy that factories used was hydropower. Hydropower works because the falling water is converted into useful things... like electricity. The way that Hallowell used hydropower was with three dams on the Vaughn Stream.

In homes the basic electricity was electric lights, for people who could afford them. That was relevant in the early 1900’s. By 1930, most people had electrical lighting. For heating, they used coal stoves, fireplaces, wood stoves and hot air furnaces. They didn’t use oil, so basically everything was run off of coal or wood. For cooking they basically had the same things as heating. They used the wood and coal stoves, and sometimes fireplaces. Some people might have even had ovens..

The machines in factories affected people a lot. Machines were replacing jobs that people had. So basically, the jobs were going away because the technology was getting better. That’s still happening a lot these days. In the homes, their life must’ve been easier, though. They would have different methods of cooking. For example, people might have had to go to bed on time with the sun. After more and more people had lights, they just probably stayed up later. This might have affected jobs, too. If people stayed up later than they might be able to work later, and get more money. Also, people would have different ways of heating. They might have cut down more wood if more people were getting wood stoves, and fireplaces. So then there would be less trees. Those are just some of the ways that this could have affected people’s daily lives.