Manchester, England/manchester037
Previous | Home | Next"John Kay the Inventor of the Fly Shuttle 1753" anticipated the Industrial Revolution. The size of the loom in the weaving process had been limited to the arms-span of the weaver as he laboriously passed the shuttle (carrying the filling threads) back and forth between the warp threads. A "fly" shuttle could be shot through the warp, increasing the efficiency of the process and the size of the cloth being manufactured. In this painting a mob (far left), believing laborsaving textile machinery will diminish employment, is trying to break into John Kay's house to smash his invention. To the right his wife is trying to hide him in a wool sheet and spirit him away. Without the fly shuttle, later steam-weaving would be impossible. John Kay was from Bury, a town 13 km north of Manchester.
