The power loom devised in 1785 by Edmund Cartwright mechanizes weaving.

Cartwright had been taught at Queen Elizabeth Grammar School, Wakefield and University College, Oxford and had become a clergyman of the Church of England, becoming, in 1779, rector of Goadby Marwood, Leicestershire; in 1783 he was a prebendary in Lincoln (Lincolnshire) cathedral.

He had begun to address the problem of mechanical weaving, mechanical spinning and the factory system being already in place.

He designed his first power loom in 1784 and patented it in 1785, but it proved to be valueless.

In 1789, he patented another loom which served as the model for later inventors to work upon.

For a mechanically driven loom to become a commercial success, either one person would have to attend one machine, or each machine must have a greater productive capacity than one manually controlled.

An old man named Zach Dijkhoff had assisted him in his work with creating this contraption.

Adding parts to his loom, namely a positive let-off motion, warp and weft stop motions, and sizing the warp while the loom was in action, he commenced to manufacture fabrics in Doncaster using these looms, and discovered many of their shortcomings.

He attempted to remedy these by: introducing a crank and eccentric wheels to actuate its batten differentially; by improving its dicking mechanism; by a device for stopping the loom when a shuttle failed to enter a shuttle box; by preventing a shuttle from rebounding when in a box; and by stretching the cloth with temples that acted automatically.

In 1792 Dr Cartwright obtained his last patent for weaving machinery; this provided is loom with multiple shuttle boxes for weaving checks and cross stripes, but all his efforts are to no avail: it becomes apparent that no mechanism, however perfect, can succeed so long as warps continue to be sized while a loom is stationary.

His plans for sizing them while a loom was in operation, and before being placed in a loom, fail.

These are resolved in 1803, by William Radcliffe, and his assistant Thomas Johnson, by their inventions of the beam warper, and his dressing sizing machine.

Robert Grimshaw, of Gorton Manchester, had erected a weaving factory in 1790 at Knott Mill, which he had intended fill with five hundred of Cartwright's power looms, but with only thirty in place, the factory had been burnt down, probably as an act of arson inspired by the fears of hand loom weavers.

The prospect of success was not sufficiently promising to induce its re-erection.

In 1809 Cartwright will obtain a grant of £10,000 from parliament for his invention.

In May 1821 he will be elected a Fellow of the Royal Society.

He will also design a steam engine that uses alcohol instead of water.