american merchants started to send trading ships to china to buy goods such as silk cinnamon and firecrackers. the most popular product was chinese tea. since the freshest tea brought the highest prices merchants wanted faster and faster shipsfast sailing ships called packets made the trip from china to the us in 6 months. this gave the tea king enough to spoil. merchants wanted even faster shipsjohn griffiths of virginia designed a new type of ship with a knife like bow and extra sails to catch all the wind. the ship was built by 2 ny merchants and was called the rainbow. the rainbow was launched in 1845. it could sail from ny and china and come back in 6 months. the merchants sold their cargo for twice as much as it cost to build the rainbow. they ordered a second clipper called the sea witch. oats main mast was more than 14 stories and and was 170 ft long. on its 3rd voyage it set a record for ships of its size sailing from china to ny in 74 days 14 hrsin the 1800s a good clip meant fast. so the ships were called clippers

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