A female mule is called a Jenny…Jack is the male mule.This looks like a jenny

Spinning Jenny

And if you’re looking at the two pictures above wondering what–if anything–the two have to do with each other, you’re in good company. Nothing, as far as I can discern. Why then the “Spinning Jenny” and not the “Spinning Jack?”

Depending on which story you believe, the Spinning Jenny was either named after the
daughter of the inventor, James Hargreaves, or the wife of one of his collaborators, Thomas Highs; Jenny was a common name at the time. So, what is a spinning jenny if it isn’t a jenny that spins?

According to legend, Hargreaves’ daughter knocked over a spinning wheel and the inventor noticed that even though the wheel had stopped, the spindle kept on spinning. He supposedly named the one-wheeled, eight-spindled machine he developed after her, Jenny. One problem with that story–one of several–is that there is no record of any of his four kids being named Jenny. As for the name of his collaborators wife, according to Wiki, she was named Susan… Many historians believe that Jenny was just an old word for “engine.”

Who knows. Ultimately, I guess, who cares.

As we discussed in an earlier post, the spinning Jenny was the textile trades answer to the rapid increase in the production of textiles by the invention of the flying shuttle. More thread and yarn were desperately needed by weavers to thread their faster weaving looms. Also according to legend, James Hargreaves kept secret his invention until his competitors noticed the falling price of yarn. They burned his place and he moved to another part of England

a spinning wheel with spindle…

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The image on our left is the spinning wheel as it existed before James Hargreaves picked up after his daughter or whoever. As you can plainly see it has only one wheel. It also has but a single spindle. The image of the spinning Jenny above displays only one wheel but it has something like eight spindles. Crank that one wheel and run all eight spindles at the same time. That would allow for a nearly eight-fold increase in yarn–no wonder Hargreaves’ competitors ran him out of town!

Of course that one wheel with the crank was harder to turn than the earlier one wheel and power assist was needed as even more spindles were added. The Industrial Revolution was underway.
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