CHAPTER VIII 
SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH AND INVENTION 
A PRIME reason for expecting future earnings to 
be greater was that we in America were applying 
science and invention to industry as we had never 
applied them before. 
[nventing is now a profession. Invention is today 
recognized as having a high cash value and is eagerly 
sought after by progressive corporations. The con- 
trast with the past, even with a few years ago, is 
very great, and the contrast is enormous with a gen- 
eration or a century ago. 
We still talk about the wonderful innovations— 
power looms, steam engines and locomotives and the 
various elements in the English “industrial revolu- 
tion” of the eighteenth century—which had such 
a profound effect on business and banking. But let 
us see who invented these inventions. 
James Watt, inventor of the steam engine, was 
not a professional inventor. He was a maker of 
mathematical instruments. Richard Arkwright, who 
invented the spinning Jenny, was a barber. Edmund 
Cartwright, who invented the power loom, was a 
clergyman. Robert Fulton, who invented the steam- 
boat, was a portrait painter. Invention was not then 
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