Industrial Revolution1865-1900

After the Civil War, industry began to grow rapidly. The growth was made possible by 2 factors:

1. Immigration 2. laissez-faire

attitude of gov’t towards big business

Before 1860, most manufacturing took place in private homes

WHY DID IT HAPPEN?

After 1870, most manufacturing took place in factories, which speeded up production. Production increased due to:

1. use of machines

2. cheap labor (immigration)

3. more efficiency (producing stuff faster & cheaper)

Assembly Line Assembly Line: all parts

of production done in a line decreasing need for skill, making workers replaceable. Based on the idea of Frederick W. Taylor & first used by Henry Ford to mass produce cars

*By producing goods faster, it meant they could be sold cheaper.

REASONS FOR ECONOMIC TRANSFORMATION Laissez-faire capitalism and

special considerations (e.g., land grants to railroad builders)

The increasing labor supply (from immigration and migration from farms)

America’s possession of a wealth of natural resources and navigable rivers

Some of the natural resources were large deposits of raw materials such as lumber, iron, & coal.

Pennsylvania provided coal & iron which were carried by railroad to mills in Chicago and Pittsburgh.

During the period from the Civil War to World War I, the United States underwent an economic transformation that involved the development of an industrial economy, the expansion of big business, the growth of large-scale agriculture, and the rise of national labor unions and industrial conflict.

EFFECT OF INDUSTRY ON WORKERS

Factories in the large cities provided jobs, but workers’ families often lived in harsh conditions, crowded into tenements and slums.

 While these industrialists made money were getting rich, their workers were suffering through long hours, low wages, & poor working conditions. As a result, they began to organize labor unions whose goal was to fight for:

1. higher wages 2. better working conditions

INVENTIONS & INVENTORS Technological change

spurred growth of industry primarily in northern cities. Several inventions helped America to industrialize even more. Some of these new technologies were:

 Bessemer Process- process to melt iron & remove impurities which produces steel, which is stronger than iron.

Electric Light bulb- Thomas Edison

perfected & marketed it to Americans, creating demand for electric lights in homes & created safer working conditions in factories

Transportation- Automobiles in

1880s Airplanes in

1903 by Wright Brothers. First flight at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina

Telephone- invented by Alexander Graham Bell= faster & easier communication

Two inventions in particular served both to improve the efficiency of communication AND to pull more women into the work place. They were the:

Typewriter- (1874) women replaced men as secretaries

Telephone- (1876) women became phone operators.

* these allowed women to earn more money than in factories

FAMOUS ROBBER-BARONS

One characteristic of the Gilded Age is that business owners made lots of money. The industrialists who became billionaires during this time were known as the Robber Barons. Some of the most famous were:

1. Andrew Carnegie (steel) He owned the Carnegie Steel Corporation

2. JP Morgan (banking & finance) He owned both GE (General Electric) & bought out Carnegie Steel

3. Cornelius Vanderbilt (railroads & lumber) He owned the first railroad between New York & Chicago

4. John D. Rockefeller (oil) He owned the Standard Oil Company which controlled 99% of oil refineries in the US

Part of the reason why these men became so rich is because the government did not regulate businesses. This kind of government policy was known as laissez-faire. They could sell their goods at much cheaper prices than small business owners, who could not compete, and went out of business.

RISE OF CORPORATIONS Many of these businesses were not owned

by individual people, but by a corporation. This meant that there was no single owner, but companies were owned by lots of shareholders (investors who own stocks or a share of a company).

Advantages of Corporations: 1. limited liability= if a corporation

goes bankrupt, creditors can’t take money from its owners. Just the company’s holdings.

2. more money to invest= take part in bigger projects than small companies.

Monopolies Many of these corporations tried to decrease competition by joining

together and forming huge monopoly. Two types of monopolies are: Vertical Integration- When a business controls all parts of

production from start to finish. Ex: Carnegie Steel Corporation

Horizontal Integration- When a business controls a single phase of productionEx: Standard Oil controlled all oil refineries

URBANIZATION As the nation’s industrial growth

continued, cities such as Chicago, Detroit, Cleveland, Pittsburgh, and New York grew rapidly as manufacturing and transportation centers.

The rapid growth of cities caused housing shortages and the need for new public services, such as sewage and water systems and public transportation. New York City was the first city to begin construction of a subway system around the turn of the twentieth century, and many cities built trolley or streetcar lines.

The Rise of Unions

Laissez-faire

ImmigrationNatural

resources

Labor unions

Early Labor Unions

immigration

Strikes

Sam Gompers

Famous Strikes 1. Haymarket

Square Riot (Chicago)—

At McCormick Reaper Factory the Knights of Labor strike for higher wages & 8 hour work day. Unaffiliated anarchists threw a bomb into the crowd, killing police. Ended the union because people thought all Knights were anarchists.

2. Homestead Strike (Carnegie Steel, PA)—

American Federation of Labor strike for higher wages & better working conditions. Company hires Pinkerton Guards who are professional strike breakers. Union loses when federal troops are sent in.

3. Pullman Strike (Chicago)– Pullman cuts wages but not rent in his company town. American Railroad Workers Union strike for higher pay & lower rent. Union loses when federal troops are sent in.