Cotton Fabric
Perhaps no other natural product has influenced the destiny of men as has cotton. It has clothed nations, enslaved men, monopolized labor, and given direction to entire industries.
The first historical mention of cotton was in the writings of the Greek historian Herodotus (484?-425? B.C.), who described having seen trees with fleece growing in them in India. Archeological discoveries have traced the use of cotton in India to 3000 B.C. or earlier. Cotton spread by trade to the Middle East, particularly Egypt, and in the 7th and 8th centuries, was brought to Spain by the Moors.
New World explorers found cotton fabrics being manufactured in Peru, Mexico, and what is now the southwestern U.S. Carbon 14 tests have dated the use of cotton in Peru as far back as 2500 B.C.
Europeans first planted cotton in the New World in Virginia, using seed from the West Indies. The need to harvest cotton when the weather is perfectly dry at first meant that the European colonists had to spend long days working in the hot sun. They eventually got around their dislike for this type of labor by importing slaves to do the work for them.
In 1793, a young American inventor named Eli Whitney (1765-1825) developed the cotton gin, which successfully separated cotton seed from the fibers by mechanical means. This single invention raised cotton exports from 400 bales a year in 1791 to 30,000 bales in 1800 and 180,000 bales in 1810. As a corollary, in the decade between 1790 and 1800, the slave population of the United states increased 33%. By 1810, there were more than a million slaves in the Southern states; by 1860, the number had risen to more than 4 million.
Since the end of World War II, the demand for cotton has been largely supplanted by one for synthetic fibers, particularly polyester and nylon. Incursions into the cotton market have in part been due to the dwindling availability of land to raise cotton.
The cultivation of cotton requires a warm, humid climate and sandy soil. From planting to flowering takes from 80 to 110 days; another 55 to 80 days are required for the flower to produce the cotton ball.
Today mechanical harvesters are most often used to gather cotton from the plants. A mechanical harvester can pick up to 650 pounds (295 kg) per hour, compared to the 15 pounds (about 7 kg) of so that a hand picker can gather in the same time. Even so, hand pickers are still sometimes preferred because mechanical harvesters tend to gather a great deal of waste matter along with the fiber.
After the cotton has been harvested, the seeds must be removed. This is done by what is essentially the same method devised by Whitney in 1793. The seed cotton is fed into a gin consisting of a series of circular saws that separate the fiber from the seeds. The fiber is then compressed into bales weighing about 478 pounds. A second ginning separates out the short fibers, leaving the more desirable longer fibers.
Turning the raw cotton into yarn requires many steps. First, any heavy impurities such as dirt or seeds are removed from the opened bales of cotton at the mill. Then the fibers are drawn into wide thin webs, which are gathered together into ropes or strands. The finer quality fibers are combed until all short lengths have been removed. Both combed and uncombed fibers are drawn and twisted. Finally the twisted fiber is further drawn and twisted to produced the finished yarn. Weaving the cotton fabric consists of interlacing lengthwise yarns with crosswise yarns to produce cotton cloth.
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