As the Industrial Revolution in America advanced throughout the 19th century, a new form of the factory system was established. This is when work is performed on a large scale at a single location.
The Boston Associates were a group of early innovators and businessmen who recruited thousands of workers (mostly girls from the countryside) to work in the factories and operate the machines. The conditions in the factories were often quite bad. The workers were made to work 12-hour days 6 days a week. The factory conditions were not regulated and often workers lost limbs, suffered from bad air quality, and even died. The workers were paid very little with the new system of wage labor.
Labor strikes began in 1824 when workers protested low wages and horrible working conditions. Many strikes occurred throughout the 1830s and '40s.
