Eli Whitney

Eli Whitney patented the cotton gin in 1794, a simple machine that pulled the sticky seeds from short-staple cotton and made the crop hugely profitable. The effect was to entrench and expand slavery across the American South just as it had seemed to be in decline, as planters put more enslaved people to work growing and picking cotton. Whitney himself made little money from the gin because the design was so easily copied. He later won government arms contracts and became known for promoting the manufacture of muskets from interchangeable parts, a method central to American mass production, though how far he actually achieved it is debated.