Article: The Cotton Gin

The Cotton Gin of 1793

Newsela Editor's Note: This article originally appeared in the February 1870 issue of Scientific American.

An agricultural article recently published in one of our leading newspapers contained a casual mention of Eli Whitney. It called him the inventor of the modern saw gin, a machine that removes seeds from cotton. This was by no means a mistake. Very few people are aware of the fact that our modern saw gin is not Mr. Whitney's invention, but an improvement upon it. The earliest cotton gin, of which I have seen more than one, was merely a wooden cylinder with wire teeth or claws running round it in circles. 

The idea of the saw gin was borrowed from Ohio. Mr. Whitney sued the earlier inventors and manufacturers for violating his patent. Their defense was that they saw no violation of the wire tooth patent. One of Mr. Whitney's original cotton gins was in the possession of my father until some 15 or 20 years ago. It was ultimately lost at an agricultural fair at Augusta, Georgia, where it had been sent for exhibition. 

I have heard my father relate many interesting facts as to the origin and early history of the cotton gin. He learned these facts, in part, from acquaintances of Mr. Whitney. There are probably not a dozen other men living to whom these facts are known. It may be well to record them here before they are forever lost. 

Whitney Worked As A Tutor

Eli Whitney was a tutor in the family of General Greene at the time he invented the cotton gin. Whitney was very good at fixing things, and the family had much confidence in his skill. On some occasion, when the watch of Mrs. Miller, a member of General Greene's household, got out of order, she gave it to Mr. Whitney to repair. He performed the work successfully to the great delight of Mrs. Miller and the admiration of the whole family. 

A short time thereafter, a gentleman called at the general's house to show a fine sample of cotton wool. He remarked while exhibiting it that there was a fortune in store for somebody who should invent a machine for separating the lint from the seed. Mrs. Miller, who was present, turned to Whitney and said, "You're the very man Mr. Whitney, for since you succeeded so well with my watch. I am sure you have ingenuity enough to make such a machine." 

After this conversation Mr. Whitney confined himself very closely to his room for several weeks. At the end, he invited the family to inspect his model of a cotton gin. It was constructed, as I have already described, with wire teeth on a revolving cylinder. But there was no method for throwing off the lint after it was separated from the seed. Instead, the lint wrapped round the cylinder, thereby jamming the operation of the machine. Mrs. Miller, seeing the difficulty, seized a common hair clothes brush, applied it to the teeth, and caught the lint. Whitney with delight exclaimed, "Madame, you have solved the problem. With this suggestion my machine is complete."  

Invention Never Made Him Rich

Unfortunately for Mr. Whitney, the prediction of the gentleman with regard to the fortune in store for the future inventor of a cotton gin never came true. Whitney was constantly in court having to defend his patent. He lived and died poor.  

So uncertain was the enforcement of the patent laws in those days that Whitney resorted to an age-old approach to protecting his right: He kept it secret.

About the year 1794 or 1795, Whitney established one of the first, if not the first, cotton gin in Washington, Georgia. The gin house had narrow grated windows, so that visitors might stand outside and watch the cotton flying from the gin without observing the operation of the machine. This was concealed behind a low screen.  

Men were not permitted to examine the machine while in operation. Women were permitted by Whitney to do so if they liked. He did not believe women capable of betraying the secret to builders.  

Man Disguised As A Woman Stole The Secret

This fact of the free admittance of women was taken advantage of by Edward Lyon. He was "a smooth-faced young man" residing in a distant part of the country who gained admission to Whitney's gin while disguised in female dress. He communicated the secret to his brother John, who immediately set to work and produced his improvement upon Whitney's invention. It was the first saw-gin ever made.   

The honor of having invented the first cotton gin is sometimes credited to Mr. Bull, a gentleman from Baltimore. Bull settled in Columbia Co., Georgia and introduced the saw gin there in the year 1795. His invention was, there seems no reason to doubt, independent of Whitney's though coming after it, the latter having come into operation in 1793. The circular saw was no doubt borrowed from Whitney or Lyon. Thus then, though Eli Whitney never reaped the profits of his great invention, it seems clear that he must be honored for it in at least some small way.

Scientific American Editor's Note:

In the extended patent disputes to which Whitney was involved, it was ultimately determined that the use of saws instead of the wire teeth did not amount to a new invention. Therefore, those who used them without license from Mr. Whitney violated his patent.

The assertion of our contributor that Mr. Whitney was not the inventor of the saw gin is therefore unjust to the gifted inventor. The man who, following Whitney's invention, first employed saws, did not invent a saw gin. He only invented a "dodge" whereby he hoped to be able to reap where Whitney had sown.