Cotton & Silk, Spinning Hargreaves's original Spinning Jenny (machine a filer), c 1765

Cotton & Silk, Spinning Hargreaves's original Spinning Jenny (machine a filer), c 1765. A reconstruction of James Hargreaves' (c 1720-1778) original of c 1765. The Spinning Jenny was a hand-powered multiple spinning machine and the first machine to improve upon the spinning wheel. The wheel of the machine is almost horizontal, whereas later versions had a vertical wheel which was easier to operate. The spinner would turn the driving wheel with his right hand, causing the spindles to rotate, while managing the draw bar, with which he controlled the drafting of the threads, with his left hand. Spinning with a jenny was not a continuous process, and other alternative methods (for instance, using Arkwright's waterframe) were later widely adopted. ©SSPL/Science Museum