where it is bleached, pre-shrunk, dyed, The Story of Cotton printed and given a special finish before History of Cotton being made into clothing or prod- ucts for the home. Other machines make knits for use No one knows Arab merchants in shirts, sweaters or exactly how old brought cotton cloth blankets. cotton is. to Europe about 800 This, then, is the story of Scientists A.D. When Columbus cotton – where and how it searching discovered America in is grown, marketed, pro- caves in 1492, he found cot- cessed and manufactured Mexico found ton growing in the into the many useful products bits of cotton Bahama Islands. By that have served the world so well for bolls and pieces 1500, cotton was so long. It is a never-ending story, as scientists of cotton cloth known generally continue to develop better ways to produce and that proved to be throughout the world. use one of the world’s oldest fibers – cotton. at least 7,000 Cotton seed are believed years old. They to have been planted in also found Florida in 1556 and in Virginia that the cotton in 1607. By 1616, colonists were itself was much like that grown growing cotton along the James in America today. River in Virginia. In the Indus River Valley in Cotton was first spun by machin- Pakistan, cotton was being ery in England in 1730. The grown, spun and woven into industrial revolution in England www.cottoncounts.net cloth 3,000 years BC. At about and the invention of the cotton 901.274.9030 the same time, natives of Egypt’s gin in the U.S. paved the way for Nile valley were making and the important place cotton holds wearing cotton clothing. in the world today.

8 Eli Whitney, a native of chase of more than $5.3 billion their cotton to a local buyer or The mixed and fluffed-up cot- Massachusetts, secured a pat- worth of supplies and services. merchant who, in turn, sells it to ton goes into a carding machine ent on the cotton gin in 1793, This stimulates business activi- a textile mill either in the United which cleans the fibers some though patent office ties for factories and enter- States or a foreign country. more and makes them lie side records indicate prises throughout the country. The seed usually is sold by the by side. The combing action of that the first Processing and handling of producer to the gin. The gin- the carding machine finishes the cotton gin cotton after it leaves the ner either sells for feed or to an job of cleaning and straightening may have farm generates even more oil mill where the linters (downy the fibers, and makes them into been built by business activity. Annual fuzz) are removed in an operation a soft, untwisted rope called a a machin- business revenue stimulated very much like ginning. Linters sliver (pronounced sly-ver). ist named Noah by cotton in the U.S. economy are baled and sold to the paper, On modern spinning frames, Homes two years before exceeds $120 billion, making batting and plastics industries, yarn is mare directly from the Whitney’s patent was filed. The cotton America’s number one while the seed is processed into sliver. The spinning devices take gin, short for engine, could do value-added crop. cottonseed oil, meal and hulls. fibers from the sliver and rotate the work 10 times faster than Cotton is a part of our daily lives it up to 2,500 revolutions in a by hand. How Cotton is Spun and Woven from the time we dry our faces second twist that makes fibers The gin made it possible to sup- on a soft cotton towel in the At the textile mill, the bales are into a yarn for weaving or knit- ply large quantities of cotton morning until we slide between opened by machines, and the ting into fabrics. fiber to the fast-growing textile fresh cotton sheets at night. lint is mixed and cleaned fur- Machines called looms weave industry. Within 10 years, the It has hundreds of uses, from ther by blowing and beating. The cotton yarns into fabrics the value of the U.S. cotton crop blue jeans to shoe short lint that comes out usually same way rose from $150,000 to more strings. Clothing is separated and sold for use in the first than $8 million. and household other industries. The best part of hand- items are the the lint consists of fibers about 1 The Importance of Cotton weaving largest uses, but inch to 1¾ inches long. frames Today, the world uses more industrial prod- did. cotton than any other fiber, and ucts account Modern cotton is a leading from many thou- looms cash crop in the sands of bales. U.S. At the farm work at great speeds, interlac- level alone, the ing the length-wise yarns (warp) production of and the crosswise yarns (filling). each year’s crop The woven fabric, called gray involves the pur- goods, is sent to a finishing plant 2 7 How Cotton is Ginned and Marketed All parts of the cotton plant are Where Cotton Grows useful. The most important is Today, nearly all through clean- Cotton grows in warm climates the fiber or lint, which is used cotton is stored ing machines that and most of the world’s cotton in making cotton cloth. Linters in modules, remove the gin is grown in the U.S., Uzbekistan, – the short fuzz on the seed which look like waste such as the People’s Republic of China – provide cellulose for making giant loaves of burs, dirt, stems and India. Other leading cot- plastics, explosives and other bread. Modules and leaf mate- ton-growing countries are Brazil, products. Linters also are incor- allow the cot- rial from the cot- Pakistan and Turkey. porated into high quality paper ton to be stored ton. Then it goes products and processed into bat- In this country, the major cotton- without loosing yield or qual- to the gin stand where circular ting for padding mattresses, fur- producing states are: Alabama, ity prior to ginning. Specially saws with small, sharp teeth niture and automobile cushions. Arizona, Arkansas, California, designed trucks pick up modules pluck the fiber from the seed. Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, The cottonseed is crushed in of seed cotton from the field and From the Missouri, New Mexico, North order to separate its three move them to the gin. Modern gin, fiber Carolina, Oklahoma, South products – oil, meal and hulls. gins place modules in front of and seed Carolina, Tennessee and Texas, Cottonseed oil is used primarily machines called module feed- go dif- Florida, Kansas and Virginia. ers. Some module feeders have for shortening, cooking oil and ferent The yield in the U.S. averages stationary heads, in which case, salad dressing. The meal and ways. approximately 1 1/3 bales per giant conveyors move the mod- hulls that remain are used either The acres and about 1,078 pounds of ules into the module feeder. separately or in combination as ginned fiber, seed. A U.S. bale weighs around Other module feeders are self- livestock, poultry and fish feed now called lint, is 500 pounds. This yield is about propelled and move down a track and as fertilizer. The stalks and pressed together and twice as much as in 1950 and is that along side the modules. The leaves of the cotton plant are made into dense bales due to better land use, improved module feeders literally break plowed under to enrich the soil. weighting about 500 plant varieties, mechanization, the modules apart and “feed” the Some cottonseed also is pounds. To determine fertilization and irrigation. It also seed cotton into the gin. Other the value of used as high-protein con- gins use powerful cotton, samples centrate in baked goods pipes to suck the are taken from each bale and other food products. cotton into the gin and classed according building. Once in to fiber length (staple), the cotton gin, the strength, micronaire, seed cotton moves color and cleanness. through dryers and Producers usually sell 6 3 is a result of much better control Producers who employ conven- weeks, the blossoms open. Their Conventional cotton stripping of disease, weeds and insects. A tional tillage practices, plow or petals change from creamy white machines use rollers equipped major part of the credit for this “list” the land into rows form- to yellow, then pink and finally, with alternating bats and brush- progress goes to scientists work- ing firm seed-beds for planting. dark red. After three days, they es to knock the open bolls from ing at experiment stations and in Producers in south Texas plant wither and fall, leaving green pods the plants into a conveyor. laboratories, and to agricultural cotton as early as February. In which are called cotton bolls. A second kind of stripper har- extension workers who bring the Missouri and other Inside the boll, vester uses a broadcast findings to farmers. northern parts which is shaped attachment that looks simi- How Cotton is Grown of the Cotton like a tiny foot- lar to a grain header on a Belt, they ball, moist fibers combine. All harvesting sys- After cotton has been harvested, plant as late grow and push tems use air to convey and producers who use conventional as June. out from the elevate the seed cotton into a tillage practices cut down and Seeding is done with mechani- newly formed seeds. storage bin referred to as a bas- chop the cotton stalks. The next cal planters which cover as many As the boll ripens, it turns ket. Once the basket is full, the step is to turn the remaining as 10 to 24 rows at a time. The brown. The fibers continue to stored seed cotton is dumped residue underneath the soil sur- planter opens a small trench or expand under the warm sun. into a boll buggy, trailer or mod- face. Producers who practice a furrow in each row, drops in the Finally, they split the boll apart ule builder. style of farming called conserva- right amount of seed, covers and the fluffy cotton bursts forth. tion tillage often choose to leave them and packs the earth on top It looks like white cotton candy. their stalks standing and leave of them. The seed is planted at the plant residue on the surface Since hand labor is no longer uniform intervals in either small of the soil. used in the U.S. to harvest cot- clumps (“hill-dropped”) or ton, the crop is harvested by In the spring, farmers singularly (“drilled”). machines, either a picker or a prepare for planting Machines called cultiva- stripper. Cotton picking machines in several ways. tors are used to uproot have spindles that pick (twist) Producers who weeds and grass, which the seed cotton from the burrs plant using no-till compete with the cotton that are attached to plants’ or conservation plant for soil nutrients, stems. Doffers then remove the tillage methods, use sunlight and water. seed cotton from the spindles special equipment (For a detailed description of picker operation, and knock the seed cotton into go to http://www.aces.edu/department/ipm/cottonpicker.htm designed to plant About two months after the conveying system. or http://www.csrl.ars.usda.gov/cppru/harv_g.htm#harv.) the seed through planting, flower buds called the litter that cov- squares appear on the cot- ers the soil surface. ton plants. In another three 4 5