While profiting from experience from abroad, Britain was very protective of domestic technology. In particular, engineers with skills in building textile factories and machines were not allowed to emigrate - particularly to newborn America. However, Samuel Slater, an engineer who had worked as an apprentice for Arkwright's partner, Jedediah Strutt, avoided the ban. In 1789, he took his skills in designing and building factories to New England and soon engaged in reproducing the textile factories that helped America with its own industrial revolution. Local inventions followed. In 1793, Eli Whitney invented and patented the cotton gin, which accelerated the processing of raw cotton by more than 50 times a pound a day.
