Samuel slater is exactly who I was thinking of, I didn't know the Lowell story but it looks like I should do some reading about it. From that link it seems like

Samuel slater is exactly who I was thinking of, I didn't know the Lowell story but it looks like I should do some reading about it. From that link it seems like they were involved in stealing ideas for similar machines with the difference being the amount of intervention required to operate them. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samuel_Slater https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samuel_Slater