Throughout history, technological advances have always altered society. Elizabeth Schwartz Cowan argues in her book A Social History of American Technology that from the earliest times, technology has had significant impact on the social, economic and political makeup. This is not a new phenomenon that started with computers. For example, mass production, transportation and especially communications have greatly impacted the world.
             The Industrial Revolution, first originating in Great Britain, quickly was accepted in the U.S. where it "flourished and took a significant new shape" (Pursell 87) and became the "American system of manufacturers." The whole purpose of this system was to transfer the product from the workers to the machines. Specialized machines could much more rapidly and efficiently mass produce parts used for such consumer goods as sewing machines, bicycles and typewriters. One thinks of Henry Ford's assembly line when regarding mass production, but Pursell (91) explains that "More than any other product, it was the bicycle that forged the link between early-nineteenth-century armory practice and early-twentieth-century mass production." In the 1890s, one company, alone, was producing 60,000 bikes a year.
             From a social standpoint, Americans started to become dependent on these machines that made life easier. Increasing numbers of people began living in the cities instead of on farms. Closer living arrangements, unfortunately led to epidemics. According to Wilentz (79), domestic service was also transformed. Hired help, as a domestic servant was called, had been a traditional worker in New England local communities. After the mid-1800s, a larger number of these workers were hired for the
             labor market, and service became a low-paid job. This "bastardization of craft," as Wilentz calls it, eliminated the traditional world of craft workers and apprentices and radically ...