Technological Innovation And Economic Change In The Iron Industry 1850 1920

Originally published in 1989 this study examines some new facets in the development of the iron industry in the USA between 1839 and 1921 through the study of an individaul form, namely the Thoms Iron Company, one of the leading merchant furnace companies. It charts the end of the anthracite iron age and the changes which brought about the advent of open-hearth steel and integrated steel works. The book discusses the problems the managers of the firm faced with the appearance of industrial innovations which tended to undermine their firm's very existence and provided a new set of optimal conditions necessary for the survival of the firm. It provides a clear understanding of the destructive forces of industrial innovation and the place of creative entrepreneurship in the survival of the firm.

This book describes technological change in an industry that played a central role in the Indsutrial Revolution. While earlier scholars have examined isolated aspects of ironmaking in the eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Britain, Charles Hyde surveys all aspects of its development. Costs, prices, profits, shrewd leaders, competition, new inventions, and productivity all figure in this story of a key industry during the major period of its evolution. The author's account illuminates not only the nature of innovation in one industry, but the nature of technologial change in general. using new data compiled form the records of the ironmaking concerns, Professor Hyde considers each of the basic economic variables affecting entrepreneurial decisions. He finds that ironmaking advanced through a process of gradual, continuous change rather than through a series of discrete innovations. The rate of diffusion of new techniques corresponded to their profitability when compared to that of existing means of production--a finding that explains that timing of innovation. Charles K. Hyde is Assistant Professor of Social Science at Monteith College, Wayne State University. Originally published in 1977. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

GEOGRAPHY, TECHNOLOGY AND THE FLUX OF OPPORTUNITY takes up the issue of the rise and decline of British economic predominance in modern times. In its analysis it emphasizes the interaction of geography with other economic, technological and political forces amid a context of other actors similarly shaped by such interactions. It argues for this as the driver of Britain's ascent as maritime, trading and colonial power, and its strongly related industrialization, as well as its decreasing competitiveness as other states were favored by their own geographical situations, and the opportunities the evolving economic and technological situation afforded.

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