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Please add Whitney to the People from Worcester County, Massachusetts category. I do not have enough edits to edit this article. -- Mcfly007 ( talk) 21:30, 3 January 2010 (UTC)
On Wikipedia's own List of common misconceptions page, it lists that he did not in fact invent the cotton gin, yet on this page it is in the first sentence. Someone needs some citations. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.75.248.209 ( talk) 23:13, 23 April 2010 (UTC)
I haven't researched this yet. I'm calling on anyone who's interested in this article to get involved. How do we KNOW that Eli Whitney, the cotton gin guy, the one who died in 1825, was a "Jr"? The reason I ask is because Roe 1916 p160 clearly says that "Eli Whitney, Jr." was the son of an ex-Governor Edwards, who was a trustee of Eli Whitney (d. 1825)'s estate. Can anyone set this straight? Was Eli Whitney (d. 1825) a "Jr" at all? If Roe is wrong, what are the refs that correct him? I suspect (not yet confirmed) that Wikipedia has this wrong currently. I may not wait to remove the "Jr" from this article title before digging up further research. If the "Jr" belongs, someone will need to come back and *show* why it should be re-added. — ¾-10 17:55, 11 July 2010 (UTC)
I don't know if anyone has bothered to email the Eli Whitney Museum, but I just did. Wikipedia must have it incorrect as I would think that the museum would have better information. Who knows. The museum says that Eli Whitney invented the cotton gin. And Eli Whitney, Jr. was his son who married Henrietta. Wikipedia has this confused. I also asked the museum to find some ancestry of Eli Whitney, the cotton gin inventor. Hopefully, someone will straighten this out. Also, the photo that Wikipedia uses is the photo of Eli Whitney and according to the museum it is NOT the photo of Eli Whitney, Jr. Mylittlezach ( talk) 18:37, 12 April 2011 (UTC)
Yes, but Wikipedia refers to the person in the photo as Eli Whitney, Jr and not Eli Whitney. There is a discrepancy from Wikipedia and the museum. Mylittlezach ( talk) 19:36, 12 April 2011 (UTC)
Hi all. With my changes of 2011-04-23 and 2011-04-24, I've now fixed all the embarrassingly wrong stuff. This includes:
Whew! What a large load of crap cleaned up! But I am happy, because this latest iteration of article version just goes to prove once more that Wikipedia is a self-correcting mechanism, given enough time. Cheers, — ¾-10 15:26, 24 April 2011 (UTC)
I've removed the following line referring to the cotton gin leading to the American slave economy: "( regardless of whether Whitney intended that or not)"
I think it was intended to point out that, though the cotton gin did indeed affect slavery, there is no reason to assume it was Whitney's intention. However, by even bringing it up, it achieves the opposite. It would be like an article on Hitler's mother that says "She gave birth to Adolf Hitler, which led directly to the Holocaust (whether she intended that or not)."
Unless there's some controversy to suggest that maybe he DID intend his invention to give a boost to the slave trade, there's no need to state it. And if that controversy exists, it should be cited. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Zegota ( talk • contribs) 05:28, 29 January 2014 (UTC)
This
edit request has been answered. Set the |answered= or |ans= parameter to no to reactivate your request. |
47.186.45.133 ( talk) 23:02, 14 November 2018 (UTC) First of all We all know that the cotton gin or the milling machine was not invented by Eli Whitney, but by a slave!Eli Whitney claimed the invention as his own, but does not deserve the credit. Go back and read some real history, before the whitewashing!
This
edit request has been answered. Set the |answered= or |ans= parameter to no to reactivate your request. |
Paragraph 4 of the "Later life and legacy" should say "who not only" not "who only". Samwri ( talk) 05:51, 30 October 2019 (UTC)
As Simon Winchester chronicles in chapter four of his book, The Perfectionists, Eli Whitney received a government contract to create muskets with interchangeable parts, but had no expertise in this area and did not deliver the weapons he promised. He deceived John Adams, Thomas Jefferson and others with a limited display. The Wikipedia article as it stands suggests he contributed to the success of wars, when in fact he compromised soldiers and his government. I would advocate adding excerpts from Winchester’s book. Niftwhich ( talk) 03:47, 31 August 2021 (UTC)
This
edit request has been answered. Set the |answered= or |ans= parameter to no to reactivate your request. |
There are two areas that need editing, both claims made several times in this article:
firstly, Eli Whitney did not, in fact, invent the cotton gin. It is now well established that he significantly improved cotton gin technology, building on earlier models at use in the South, the earliest of which stemmed from Asia and Africa Source: Angela Lakwete, Inventing the Cotton Gin: Machine and Myth in Antebellum America (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, 2005).
Additionally, there is no real evidence that Eli Whitney hoped that his modification of the cotton gin would reduce the South's reliance on slavery. Instead, this often repeated account appears to be a myth. In fact, Whitney spent considerable time in Georgia as a tutor (as mentioned in the article), working on a plantation which used slave labor, where he became aware of the stopgap in cotton processing, which he sought to alleviate. Source: Hatfield, Edward. "Eli Whitney in Georgia." New Georgia Encyclopedia, last modified Oct 31, 2018. https://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/articles/history-archaeology/eli-whitney-in-georgia/ and also “Eli Whitney's Patent for the Cotton Gin,” National Archives https://www.archives.gov/education/lessons/cotton-gin-patent
There doesn't seem to be any evidence that Whitney was disturbed by slavery in any way. Instead, his invention was intended to speed up the processing of cotton, a job done by enslaved labor. He wrote to his father in Sept 11, 1793 that he had perfected a device by which “one man will clean ten times as much cotton as he can in any other way before known.”
Source: “Correspondence of Eli Whitney Relative to the Invention of the Cotton Gin.” The American Historical Review 3, no. 1 (1897): 90–127, p. 100 https://doi.org/10.2307/1832812.
That same year, in a Nov 24 1793 letter to Thomas Jefferson, Whitney wrote about how he hoped to improve the speed of cotton processing, because currently, “it is the stated task of one negro to clean fifty weight (I mean fifty pounds after it is separated from the seed), of the green seed cotton per day.”
“Correspondence of Eli Whitney Relative to the Invention of the Cotton Gin.” The American Historical Review 3, no. 1 (1897): 90–127, p. 100, fn. 1. https://doi.org/10.2307/1832812.
These letters suggest that Whitney hoped to increase the rapidity of cotton processing, while fully aware that this was a task consigned to slaves. Wansin457 ( talk) 17:33, 15 December 2022 (UTC)
Please remove the beginning line of the second paragraph that says "Whitney himself believed that his invention would reduce the need for enslaved labor and help hasten the end of southern slavery." The claim cites this site which has since been deleted, likely because it's incorrect. There's no evidence I could find online that Eli Whitney planned to end slavery with the cotton gin beyond this source and the wikipedia which references this source. Instead, I found an overwhelming number of sources listing his motivation as cash, hoping to patent the cotton gin. Please delete the inaccurate claim for me as I don't have the valid permissions (I think). Troglodyte8 ( talk) 17:53, 15 February 2023 (UTC)
I didn’t see anything on this 47.5.105.168 ( talk) 16:16, 26 April 2023 (UTC)
This is the
talk page for discussing improvements to the
Eli Whitney article. This is not a forum for general discussion of the article's subject. |
Article policies
|
Find sources: Google ( books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL |
Archives: 1 |
This article is written in American English, which has its own spelling conventions (color, defense, traveled) and some terms that are used in it may be different or absent from other varieties of English. According to the relevant style guide, this should not be changed without broad consensus. |
A fact from this article was featured on Wikipedia's Main Page in the On this day section on March 14, 2006 and March 14, 2007. |
This
level-4 vital article is rated C-class on Wikipedia's
content assessment scale. It is of interest to the following WikiProjects: | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
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|
Please add Whitney to the People from Worcester County, Massachusetts category. I do not have enough edits to edit this article. -- Mcfly007 ( talk) 21:30, 3 January 2010 (UTC)
On Wikipedia's own List of common misconceptions page, it lists that he did not in fact invent the cotton gin, yet on this page it is in the first sentence. Someone needs some citations. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.75.248.209 ( talk) 23:13, 23 April 2010 (UTC)
I haven't researched this yet. I'm calling on anyone who's interested in this article to get involved. How do we KNOW that Eli Whitney, the cotton gin guy, the one who died in 1825, was a "Jr"? The reason I ask is because Roe 1916 p160 clearly says that "Eli Whitney, Jr." was the son of an ex-Governor Edwards, who was a trustee of Eli Whitney (d. 1825)'s estate. Can anyone set this straight? Was Eli Whitney (d. 1825) a "Jr" at all? If Roe is wrong, what are the refs that correct him? I suspect (not yet confirmed) that Wikipedia has this wrong currently. I may not wait to remove the "Jr" from this article title before digging up further research. If the "Jr" belongs, someone will need to come back and *show* why it should be re-added. — ¾-10 17:55, 11 July 2010 (UTC)
I don't know if anyone has bothered to email the Eli Whitney Museum, but I just did. Wikipedia must have it incorrect as I would think that the museum would have better information. Who knows. The museum says that Eli Whitney invented the cotton gin. And Eli Whitney, Jr. was his son who married Henrietta. Wikipedia has this confused. I also asked the museum to find some ancestry of Eli Whitney, the cotton gin inventor. Hopefully, someone will straighten this out. Also, the photo that Wikipedia uses is the photo of Eli Whitney and according to the museum it is NOT the photo of Eli Whitney, Jr. Mylittlezach ( talk) 18:37, 12 April 2011 (UTC)
Yes, but Wikipedia refers to the person in the photo as Eli Whitney, Jr and not Eli Whitney. There is a discrepancy from Wikipedia and the museum. Mylittlezach ( talk) 19:36, 12 April 2011 (UTC)
Hi all. With my changes of 2011-04-23 and 2011-04-24, I've now fixed all the embarrassingly wrong stuff. This includes:
Whew! What a large load of crap cleaned up! But I am happy, because this latest iteration of article version just goes to prove once more that Wikipedia is a self-correcting mechanism, given enough time. Cheers, — ¾-10 15:26, 24 April 2011 (UTC)
I've removed the following line referring to the cotton gin leading to the American slave economy: "( regardless of whether Whitney intended that or not)"
I think it was intended to point out that, though the cotton gin did indeed affect slavery, there is no reason to assume it was Whitney's intention. However, by even bringing it up, it achieves the opposite. It would be like an article on Hitler's mother that says "She gave birth to Adolf Hitler, which led directly to the Holocaust (whether she intended that or not)."
Unless there's some controversy to suggest that maybe he DID intend his invention to give a boost to the slave trade, there's no need to state it. And if that controversy exists, it should be cited. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Zegota ( talk • contribs) 05:28, 29 January 2014 (UTC)
This
edit request has been answered. Set the |answered= or |ans= parameter to no to reactivate your request. |
47.186.45.133 ( talk) 23:02, 14 November 2018 (UTC) First of all We all know that the cotton gin or the milling machine was not invented by Eli Whitney, but by a slave!Eli Whitney claimed the invention as his own, but does not deserve the credit. Go back and read some real history, before the whitewashing!
This
edit request has been answered. Set the |answered= or |ans= parameter to no to reactivate your request. |
Paragraph 4 of the "Later life and legacy" should say "who not only" not "who only". Samwri ( talk) 05:51, 30 October 2019 (UTC)
As Simon Winchester chronicles in chapter four of his book, The Perfectionists, Eli Whitney received a government contract to create muskets with interchangeable parts, but had no expertise in this area and did not deliver the weapons he promised. He deceived John Adams, Thomas Jefferson and others with a limited display. The Wikipedia article as it stands suggests he contributed to the success of wars, when in fact he compromised soldiers and his government. I would advocate adding excerpts from Winchester’s book. Niftwhich ( talk) 03:47, 31 August 2021 (UTC)
This
edit request has been answered. Set the |answered= or |ans= parameter to no to reactivate your request. |
There are two areas that need editing, both claims made several times in this article:
firstly, Eli Whitney did not, in fact, invent the cotton gin. It is now well established that he significantly improved cotton gin technology, building on earlier models at use in the South, the earliest of which stemmed from Asia and Africa Source: Angela Lakwete, Inventing the Cotton Gin: Machine and Myth in Antebellum America (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, 2005).
Additionally, there is no real evidence that Eli Whitney hoped that his modification of the cotton gin would reduce the South's reliance on slavery. Instead, this often repeated account appears to be a myth. In fact, Whitney spent considerable time in Georgia as a tutor (as mentioned in the article), working on a plantation which used slave labor, where he became aware of the stopgap in cotton processing, which he sought to alleviate. Source: Hatfield, Edward. "Eli Whitney in Georgia." New Georgia Encyclopedia, last modified Oct 31, 2018. https://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/articles/history-archaeology/eli-whitney-in-georgia/ and also “Eli Whitney's Patent for the Cotton Gin,” National Archives https://www.archives.gov/education/lessons/cotton-gin-patent
There doesn't seem to be any evidence that Whitney was disturbed by slavery in any way. Instead, his invention was intended to speed up the processing of cotton, a job done by enslaved labor. He wrote to his father in Sept 11, 1793 that he had perfected a device by which “one man will clean ten times as much cotton as he can in any other way before known.”
Source: “Correspondence of Eli Whitney Relative to the Invention of the Cotton Gin.” The American Historical Review 3, no. 1 (1897): 90–127, p. 100 https://doi.org/10.2307/1832812.
That same year, in a Nov 24 1793 letter to Thomas Jefferson, Whitney wrote about how he hoped to improve the speed of cotton processing, because currently, “it is the stated task of one negro to clean fifty weight (I mean fifty pounds after it is separated from the seed), of the green seed cotton per day.”
“Correspondence of Eli Whitney Relative to the Invention of the Cotton Gin.” The American Historical Review 3, no. 1 (1897): 90–127, p. 100, fn. 1. https://doi.org/10.2307/1832812.
These letters suggest that Whitney hoped to increase the rapidity of cotton processing, while fully aware that this was a task consigned to slaves. Wansin457 ( talk) 17:33, 15 December 2022 (UTC)
Please remove the beginning line of the second paragraph that says "Whitney himself believed that his invention would reduce the need for enslaved labor and help hasten the end of southern slavery." The claim cites this site which has since been deleted, likely because it's incorrect. There's no evidence I could find online that Eli Whitney planned to end slavery with the cotton gin beyond this source and the wikipedia which references this source. Instead, I found an overwhelming number of sources listing his motivation as cash, hoping to patent the cotton gin. Please delete the inaccurate claim for me as I don't have the valid permissions (I think). Troglodyte8 ( talk) 17:53, 15 February 2023 (UTC)
I didn’t see anything on this 47.5.105.168 ( talk) 16:16, 26 April 2023 (UTC)