What was Richard Arkwright well known as? [br] [originaltext] Richard Arkw

Richard Arkwright was born on December 23, 1732, in Preston, Lancashire, to a poor family. He was taught to read and write by his cousin, and later became apprenticed to a barber. Arkwright was an ambitious man, however, and soon struck out on his own. He started a wig-making business, in the course of which he travelled widely in Great Britain, collecting hair for his wigs. On his travels he met John Kay, who had invented a new spinning machine for the burgeoning textile industry. Arkwright was so impressed by Kay’s machine that he hired the man to build it for him. The new Spinning Frame produced a thread far stronger than any- thing available at that time, and it was able to spin 128 threads at one time. Equally important, from Arkwright’s point of view, the machine did not require a skilled operator to run it. Unfortunately, the size of the Spinning Frame made hand-operation impossible. Arkwright tried using horsepower, but finally settled on using a waterwheel to power the machine. In 1771 he and his business partners Jedediah Strutt and Samuel Need established a factory on the banks of the River Derwent in Cromford, Derbyshire. Arkwright was the first to successfully create a system of mass-production. His factories and his methods were widely copied throughout Eng- land and around the world.