John Styles, professor emeritus at the University of Hertfordshire and a Huntington fellow, discusses the contributions of John Holker (1719–1786), who has been described as "the most important individual in the whole process of technology transfer in the 18th century.’’
Lectures
Raised in Lancashire but exiled to France after joining the failed Jacobite Rebellion of 1745, Holker began his career as an industrial spy in 1751 with a clandestine mission to England. He returned with 115 samples of the kinds of Lancashire textiles that would shortly propel the Industrial Revolution.
