Born on December 8, 1765, in Westboro, Massachusetts, Eli Whitney studied at Yale before going on to invent the cotton gin, a device that highly streamlined the process of extracting fiber from cotton seeds. With the patent for his device being widely pirated, Whitney struggled to earn any recompense for his invention. He later went on to pioneer “interchangeable parts” systems of production.
Eli Whitney was born on December 8, 1765, in Westboro, Massachusetts. He grew up on a farm, yet had an affinity for machine work and technology. As a youth during the Revolutionary War, he became an expert at making nails from a device of his own invention. He later crafted canes and ladies' hatpins, recognizing opportunity when it arose.
In 1789, Whitney started to attend Yale College and graduated in 1792, with some deliberation about becoming a lawyer. Upon graduation, Whitney was hired to be a tutor in South Carolina. On his way to his new position via boat, he met Catherine Greene, the widow of a Revolutionary War general. Once Whitney found out that his agreed-upon tutoring salary was to be halved, he refused the job and instead accepted Greene's offer to read law at her Mulberry Grove plantation. There he met Phineas Miller, another Yale alum, who was Greene's fiancé and manager of her estate.
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