This American industrial pioneer left as his legacy a manufacturing system, booming mill towns, and a humanitarian attitude toward workers. In just six years, Francis Cabot Lowell built up an American textile manufacturing industry. He was born in Newburyport, Massachusetts in 1775, and became a successful merchant.

Cabot died of idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis at his summer home in La Malbaie, Quebec, on November 19, 2011. He was 86.

Francis Cabot Lowell invented the use of a power loom based on his observation of factories in England.

The significance of Lowell Mills was crucial during the industrial revolution as it brought many changes. Dehumanizing conditions on the laborers were improved, and the laborers started to be paid better wages, and their working conditions were also considered to ensure they worked in better environments.