Download Audio Books from Audible.

Customer reviews

5 star		45%
4 star		28%
3 star		19%
2 star		5%
1 star		4%

How are ratings calculated?

Review this product

Top reviews from the United States

There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.

B. Zimmer

Fascinating Americans!

Reviewed in the United States on December 9, 2012

Verified Purchase

You must read this book if you have the least interest in American history, especially that of the Midwest and Northeast in the early 1800s. You might think that you're not interested in the manufacture of mass-produced furniture in Cincinnati in the 1820s or the development of canals in New York state or steamship travel on the Mississippi. But the details of American's world-shaking pursuit of producing manufactured goods in the early 1800s reinforces the stories we've always heard about the American psyche: We come from innovative, hard-working, creative, pushy ancestors who took full advantage of unlimited water, wood, and mineral resources to create unheard-of industrialization.

Partly as a reaction to the blockades and taxes of the English, England's almost complete control of the market for goods, and the War of 1812, this country rebelled, looked around, and discovered it could mass-produce its own goods. Water power was everywhere, forests were there for the taking, minerals were hiding beneath the top soil, slave power was available, and immigrants' energy and independence were bursting at the seams.

The first chapter, about the War of 1812 battles between English and American ships on Lakes Erie and Ontario, serves as an introduction to the marvels of shipbuilding in a country which barely had a navy. The following chapters jump quickly into the fascinating development of America's great experiment: mass-production.

(Of special interest if you're buying a digital book [Kindle]: I bought this book on Nov. 21 for $9.57. Kindle is now charging $15.94. The hardback edition is still $19.)

Steve Paul

Filled with Anecdotes Explaining US Explosive Growth (3.9% per year) for 135 Years

Reviewed in the United States on June 7, 2014

Verified Purchase

I loved reading Morris’ The Dawn of Innovation: The First American Industrial Revolution. It's filled with interesting anecdotes to explain the explosive and sustained growth of the United States for 135 years, from 1778 to the eve of the First World War.

I wish our present leaders would read this book to better understand present-day US competitiveness.

Here are some representative quotes from the book that explain the US role during the first Industrial Revolution:

* “The United States never disguised its avarice for British textile technology. It refused to recognize British patents, and American entrepreneurs openly advertised for British power-spinning experts, who were forbidden by law from emigrating.”

“American system of manufacturing.” -- meant manufacturing to an idealized model to such a level of precision that parts could be freely interchanged between weapons without loss of performance.”

* "British shipbuilding factories were the most advanced in the world, employing massive, very precise machines that mid-century Americans could not replicate. What was missing, perhaps, was the American instinct to push for scale, the conviction that the first objective of business should be to grow larger."

* “Over time, the act helped settle some 10 percent of the entire land mass of the United States. Senator Justin Morrill's (R-VT) 1862 land-grant college act awarded each state a bequest of public lands that it could sell to finance state colleges for the agricultural and industrial arts. No other country had conceived the notion of educating farmers and mechanics, and the Morrill Act schools are still the foundation of the state university system.”

You'll recognize many parallels with China's growth today.

Brett

A fantastic, readable study of American and British industrialization

Reviewed in the United States on February 5, 2013

Verified Purchase

While there are many books out there with considerable detail on the subjects of machine and industrialization, Morris' s book stands alone in its incredible readability while weaving those details into a great narrative. I had a hard time putting the book down.

It begins with a long chapter on the Great Lake theatre of conflict in the War of 1812. In all honesty, this is the weakest part of the book - while some may find that military history fascinating, I was eventually skimming it on my way to Chapter 2.

Chapter 2 more than made up for that. Morris discusses the rise of British machinery and industrialization, including details on fascinating personalities and efforts such a Charles Babbage and his proposed analytical machine (which was nearly the mechanical equivalent of a computer, or would have been if it had been completed). At every point, Morris drives home how British industrialization was driven by a thirst for ever greater precision, and a kind of technophilia and tinkering culture that goes a long ways towards explaining why they pioneered the way into the Industrial Era.

But the real heart of the book lies in the chapters that follow, which discuss the concurrent rise of American industrialization and machinery. It's impossible for me to truly do it justice here, but Morris shows with great detail and wit how the American experience, with its scarcer labor, abundant natural resources, and focus on producing consumer products on a large scale, ultimately led the US to surpass the British in production.

Morris concludes by briefly examining the rise of China, comparing aspects of it to the US experience of rising in the wake of British industrial and military power. This segment is fairly straightforward, but Morris provides a very even-handed examination of some of the challenges China may face.

All in all, this is one of the best economic history books for laymen that I've ever read, and easily my favorite nonfiction book from 2012. I strongly recommend you read this.

Top reviews from other countries

Mr. Ross Maynard

Interesting and readable if a little random

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on November 5, 2020

Verified Purchase

Charles Morris writes well and his book on industrial innovation and development in the nineteenth century US is a good read, but I find its content a little "random".

The book starts with a long chapter about an arms race between Great Britain and the US on Lake Ontario during the War of 1812. It is overlong in my view and seems to bear no relation to the rest of the book about industrial development. This topic gets much more space than Carnegie or Rockefeller for example.

Other choices seem a bit random too. There's good and interesting coverage about the development of the US arms industry but nothing about the electric telegraph or telephone (both surely key to industrial expansion). Thomas Edison gets one line and powered fllight nothing (although I can accept that the industrail impact of flight comes later than the scope of this book). Coverage of railroad (railway) developments and engine building is interesting but feels incomplete, and there is no discussion about the development and spread of electric power.

It is an enjoyable book and a good read. I am just not sure it is a thorough history of the industrial revolution in the United States.

Zale Tabakman

Wonderful Book For An Entreprenour To Read

Reviewed in Canada on January 19, 2016

Verified Purchase

LOVED THE Book!
His technical descriptions are very weak (I am an nerdy engineer)
but his descriptions of the business side and the general issues are fantastic.

See all reviews