ABSTRACT
Throughout the first three-quarters of the nineteenth century the forces which had led to the area's rise to importance continued to operate. The steady growth in the demand for iron and for the cruder iron products meant a progressive expansion of the heavy industries. The former had become the home of the more highly finished products, expressed in many different metals; the Black Country was concerned mainly with the heavy industries and the cruder manufactures. The great depression which lay on industry from 1875 to 1886, with only a short interval of comparative prosperity, stands as a watershed between two industrial eras. The heavy trades continued their migration to the coast. Other industries were forced to surrender a larger and larger part of their market to the foreigner; while many others during the quarter of a century prior to the war remained practically stationary.
