Short answers, pulled from the story.
The Waltham-Lowell system was a labor and production model used in the New England textile industry during the early 19th century. It combined vertically integrated manufacturing, with all stages of cotton-to-cloth production under one roof, with a workforce of young women recruited from rural farms who lived in supervised company boarding houses.
The mill girls were young women recruited from rural New England farms and small towns to work in the textile mills. They lived in company boarding houses under strict codes of conduct, worked roughly 80 hours a week, and earned more than they could at home.
The Boston Manufacturing Company was incorporated in 1814. It was established by a group of investors called the Boston Associates, led by Francis Cabot Lowell, and was the first firm in the nation to place cotton-to-cloth production under one roof.
The system collapsed by mid-century because competition drove wages down, mill girls left during and after the Civil War and did not return, and Irish immigrants willing to work for lower wages replaced the original workforce. The model proved unprofitable and was abandoned.
The Rhode Island System was created by British immigrant Samuel Slater starting in 1793, and it recruited entire families rather than single young women. The Waltham-Lowell system, by contrast, hired young women individually, housed them in supervised boarding houses, and used a vertically integrated single-plant production model.
The settlement was incorporated as the town of Lowell in 1826 and became a city ten years later. It grew to host ten textile corporations and became one of the largest cities in New England.