Eli Whitney’s cotton gin was not as instrumental in pushing the United States to Civil War as many believe, a history professor said on Feb. 27 at the Godbey Lecture Series in Dallas.
Ariel Ron, associate professor of the U.S. Civil War era and director of the Clements Center for Southwest Studies at SMU, was a guest at the Godbey Lecture Series on campus. Ron debunked misconceptions about Eli Whitney’s inventions revolutionizing the Southern economy and playing a large part in starting the Civil War.
“The idea that there was a bottleneck in cotton production that could not be overcome until Whitney came along is not the case,” Ron said. “It was demand from Britain’s textile manufacturers that drove the expansion of the cotton kingdom far more than any particular way of ginning the cotton.”
Ron is the author of the award-winning book, “Grassroots Leviathan: Agricultural Reform and the Rural North in the Slaveholding Republic,” which won an award from the Agricultural History Society and the Center for Civil War Research. He has also earned fellowships from the Library of Congress, Cornell University and Yale University. Through his research, Ron understands Whitney’s true impact on U.S. history.
The idea that Whitney pioneered guns made of interchangeable parts is another myth, Ron said. While Whitney’s factory manufactured 10,000 muskets under a contract with the United States, and he intended the parts to be interchangeable, the components were far too imprecise to be interchangeable, he said.
“When it comes to interchangeable parts, Whitney has little claim to have contributed much at all,” Ron said. “The idea was certainly not new with him. It existed at least since the 18th century, probably longer than that.”
However, while the myths that Whitney single handedly shaped U.S. history are untrue, his contributions to history should not be disregarded, said Kathleen Wellman, an SMU history professor who attended the lecture.
“He may not have prevailed, but think of all the interesting things he found that expands our view of the entire period,” Wellman said.
It’s lectures like these that reformulate commonly held ideas about history that excite Karisa Cloward, an associate professor in the political science department. She helps organize the Godbey Lecture Series.
“Professor Ron showed that the real history is much more interesting and complicated, and that Whitney’s fame can be traced to dubious efforts by others to glorify Whitney’s achievements,” Cloward said. “Engaging in talks like Professor Ron’s, that push their audience to rethink what they believe they know about historical figures and events, are a big part of why I enjoy organizing the Godbey Anniversary Lecture Series each year.”
