Spinning Mule

The spinning mule is a cotton and wool spinning machine that Samuel Crompton built between 1775 and 1779, combining James Hargreaves's spinning jenny, which let one operator run many spindles at once, with the drawing rollers of Richard Arkwright's water frame; Crompton called it a mule because, like the crossbred animal, it combined the traits of its two parents. His original wooden machine carried 48 spindles and could spin about one pound of 60s-count thread a day, and unlike the jenny's comparatively weak thread, which served only as weft, the mule produced yarn strong and fine enough to be used as either warp or weft, making it suitable for any kind of textile.