CHAPTER 12

INDUSTRIALIZATION(1865-1901)

THE RISE OF INDUSTRY

• America became much more industrialized after the CW as people left farms to work in mines and factories

• Late 1800s – U.S. became the world’s leading industrial nation

• GDP by 1914 was 8x what it was in 1865

NATURAL RESOURCES

• U.S. benefits from a lot of NRs – Timber, coal, iron…– why/how does this help?

• Westward expansion and building of the transcontinental RR speed up industrialization (why?)

• Emergence of the oil industry in PA (Edwin Drake, 1859)

History of PetroleumDRAKE

ANSWER

WHAT HAPPENED TO AMERICA’S POPULATION FROM 1860 TO 1910?

- it nearly tripled

REVIEW QUESTION

LIST 3 EFFECTS THIS HAD ON THE INDUSTRIALIZATION OF AMERICA. THINK ECONOMICALLY AND SOCIALLY/CULTURALLY.

REVIEW ANSWER

LIST 3 EFFECTS THIS HAD ON THE INDUSTRIALIZATION OF AMERICA. THINK ECONOMICALLY AND SOCIALLY/CULTURALLY.

1. provided a large labor force2. created demand for consumer goods3. changed the ethnic makeup of the

nation

LARGE WORKFORCE

• 1860 – 1910: American population triples– Why was it growing so

fast?– Effects on industry?

NEW INVENTIONS(In addition to natural resources and labor, new inventions/technology were crucial to the industrial process. New technology increased productivity

and improved both transportation and communication)

Alexander Graham Bell and the telephone ((1870s)

Thomas Edison and just about everything (1870s – 1880s)

George Westinghouse: train breaks and

electricity (1880s – 1890s)

IMPACT OF TECHNOLOGY

• Everyday life was changed by inventions such as the ice machine and refrigerated RR cars

• Clothing industry was changed by standardized sizes and the automatic loom

• Trans-Atlantic telegraph cable in 1866

How would your life be without this?

12.2 – THE RAILROADS

• Explosion of RR from 1865 to 1900 – 35,000 miles to 200,000

miles of track

• Pacific Railway Act (1862)– Spurs growth of RR w/

government land grants

TRANSCONTINENTAL RAILROAD• Construction began in 1865 and was

finished in 1869

• Union Pacific – led by Grenville Dodge– Started from Omaha and worked west– Veterans, Irish labor

• Central Pacific– Started by Theodore Judah, sold stock

to the “Big 4” (Stanford, Crocker, Hopkins, Huntington)

– Started construction on the west coast and worked east

– Chinese labor

Leland Stanford

TRANSCONTINENTAL RAILROAD – cont.

Final construction finished with the two lines meeting in Utah on May 10, 1869.

IMPACT OF THE TRANSCONTINENTAL RR

1. Time Zones

2. Increased # of markets for goods

3. Stimulated economy by increased spending on steel, coal, timber…

4. Created new jobs (such as?)

5. Connected the nation psychologically

6. Led to the integration of smaller RR networks (Cornelius Vanderbilt)

12.3 – THE RISE OF BIG BUSINESS• Pre-Civil War – most businesses were

small (family owned, one owner…..)

• Post- Civil War – large businesses began to dominate the economy

• Largely due to the growth of corporations – an organization owned by many people but treated by the law as though it were a person– Owned by

stockholders/shareholders– Selling of stock enables Cs to raise

a lot of money– This money allows them to spread

out the risk and to generate money to invest, research, hire…..

What do you think are the largest American corporations?

RISE OF BIG BUSINESS cont.

• Economies of Scale – corporations were now able to decrease the cost of manufacturing by producing goods quickly and in large quantities…..big business was getting very efficient– Fixed vs. operating costs?(see “The Rise of Big Business” worksheet)

CONSOLIDATING INDUSTRY

• By the 1870s competition had reduced many industries to just a few large corporations– Examples today?– Carnegie, Rockefeller,

and Morgan were giants of business at this time

TITANS OF INDUSTRY

Andrew Carnegie

John D. Rockefeller

J.P.Morgan

12.4 – UNIONS

WHAT IS THE POINT OF A UNION?

UNIONS cont.• Problems for industrial workers in the

19th century:– Unsafe, unclean working

conditions– Very long work weeks– Growing gap between wealthy

and working classes– Low/unfair wages (in 1900 the

average worker was paid 0.22/hr and worked 59 hrs/week)

• The issue for workers was that they had little to no power to change these circumstances

EARLY UNIONS• Craft Workers vs. Common

Laborers?

• Trade Unions – formed by craft workers as early as the 1830s– more skilled workers, more

leverage against management

• Industrial Unions – united all workers in a particular industry– Less skilled, less leverage

• Which ones were businesses more likely to work with and why?

COMPANIES OPPOSE UNIONS

1. Require workers to sign oaths or sign contracts

2. Hire detectives to identify union organizers

3. Blacklist individuals

4. Lockouts

5. Hire replacements (scabs)

POLITICAL & SOCIAL OPPOSITION TO UNIONS

• No laws protecting union workers or union rights

• Courts often were against unions (why?)

• Fear of Marxism/anarchism/un-Americanism

Karl Marx

NEW UNIONS EMERGE• Unions took different approaches to achieve their

goals, gave rise to new unions

• American Federation of Labor (AFL)– Focused on skilled labor– Samuel Gompers (goals and strategy?)– Largest union by 1900 (who was

discriminated against)

• Industrial Workers of the World (IWW)

– Sought to unite all workers according to industry (regardless of skill level)

– Different strategies than AFL (more prone to use strikes)

– Never as large as the AFL, seen as more radical

WHAT ABOUT WORKING WOMEN?

• By 1900 women made up about 18% of the workforce

– Only 1/3 were industrial workers

– Received unequal pay– Created their own unions • Ex. Int’l Ladies’ Garment

Workers Union

Mary Harris Jones – “Mother Mary”