Join our lunchtime seminar to delve into questioning how the cotton industry allowed Manchester to become the metropolis it is today. We've all heard the name "Cottonopolis" - a name that evokes images of vast factories and mills churning out cotton cloth that would be shipped across England and the world - but quite how Manchester came to earn this title is perhaps less well known.

In this lunchtime seminar, Edmond Smith and Janette Martin (Research and Learning Manager at the Rylands) will use the remarkable Rylands collections to delve into the history of the city and explain why it was in Manchester that Britain's cotton revolution would take place. To do so, the talk will examine some of the earliest firms that shaped the city and how they developed alongside Britain's trade and empire in the 18th century. In this way, we will follow a global origin story that seeks to place the nascent cotton industry of Manchester in the widest possible context.

Edmond Smith is the Principle Investigator on an Economic and Social Research Council funded project 'Risky Business: Investing in Innovation and Britain’s Economic Development, 1600-1750'

Image: Illustration from Progress of Cotton, James Richard Barfoot, c1840 (R233188)

For event enquires, you can contact us by email at jrl.events@manchester.ac.uk or telephone on 0161 306 0555

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