Arkwright, Sir Richard

b. 1732; d. 1792

British inventor of cotton-spinning machinery, born in Preston, Lancashire, the youngest of 13 children. His parents were poor, and he was apprenticed to a barber. He established himself in this occupation at Bolton in 1750. Arkwright studied cotton machinery but, as he had little mechanical skill, he secured the assistance of John Kay, a watchmaker of Warrington, in the carrying out of his designs. About 1767 he seems to have invented his celebrated spinning-frame, of which the chief value was its provision of warp, which Hargreave's spinning-jenny could not produce. In 1769 he took out a patent for this, and erected his first mill at Nottingham. In 1771, with Jedediah Strutt and Samuel Need as partners, he built larger factories at Cromford, in Derbyshire. In 1775 he took out a fresh patent for further improvements but these patents were continuously infringed on all sides, and in 1781 he took action in the courts. Public opinion, however, was inimical, and the verdict went against him. The working classes, fearing the loss of their livelihood, hated him as a labour-saver. He was knighted in 1786.

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