Transcript Gilded Age Cities

Gilded Age Cities
Chapter 25
Characteristics of Urbanization
During the Gilded Age
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Megalopolis.
Mass Transit.
Magnet for economic and social opportunities.
Pronounced class distinctions.
- Inner & outer core
New frontier of opportunity for women.
Squalid living conditions for many.
Political machines.
Ethnic neighborhoods.
Urban Expansion
• Factories moving to cities which spurred
industrial growth, innovations, etc.
• U.S. population in 1900 = 40 million
• Urban population tripled 1870-1900
• Agricultural innovations forced thousands of
farmers into the cities
• Glitter of cities attracted thousands
Urban Growth: 1870 1900
W. Le
Baron
Jenney:
Central
Y.M.C.A.,
Chicago,
1891
Louis
Sullivan:
Bayard
Bldg.,
NYC,
1897
Frank Lloyd Wright:
Hollyhock House [Los Angeles],
1917
Woolworth
Bldg.
NYC - 1911
Grand Central Station, 1913
John A. Roebling:
The Brooklyn Bridge, 1883
“New Immigration” (18601900)
• 15 million immigrants came to U.S.
• 75% moved to Northeast
• Growing number from Southern and Eastern
Europe (Italy, Poland, Russia, AustriaHungary, Greece, Turkey, Syria) etc.
• Made up 40% of immigrants during this era
– 60% were still “Old Immigrants” (Western
European countries such as Britian, Germany,
Ireland)
Asians and Latin Americans
• Many worked on railroads
• Performed hardest and dirtiest work
• By 1880, 15,000 Asian immigrants in
U.S.
• 9% of California’s population
• Asians: usually stayed West
• Latin Americans: moved to Southwest
Nativism
• “Old Immigrant”, Asian and Latin
American immigrants faced nativism
– Job Competition
– Seen as more “un-American”
– Would work for lower wages
– Unions were usually anti-immigration
– Bosses preyed upon them
Chinese Exclusion Act (1882)
• Gov’t laws restricting
immigration
• Forbade the
immigration of Chinese
for a number of years
• 1898: U.S. v. Wong Kim
Ark: Supreme Court
ruled 14th Amendment
guaranteed citizenship
to all persons born in
U.S. giving protection to
Chinese Americans.
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City Pattern
• Center: Poorest areas (ghetto, slums)
– Was previously middle class
– Usually near industry
– Unsanitary
• Working class, middle class and rich made
rings around center of cities
– Transportation innovations (streetcars, trolleys,
subways) allowed wealthier to move out of city
• Neighborhoods usually segregated by race,
ethnicity
“Dumbell“ Tenement
“Dumbell“ Tenement, NYC
Jacob Riis:
How the Other
Half Lived
(1890)
Tenement Slum Living
Lodgers Huddled
Together
Tenement Slum Living
Struggling Immigrant
Families
Mulberry Street – “Little Italy”
Urban Reform
• Inspired by:
– Poverty
– Immigration
– Corruption in Government (Party Bosses)
– Corruption in Big Business
Jane Addams
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• Settlement house
movement
• Hull House (1889)
• Use religious ideas
to deal with poverty,
social ills
• Primary focus:
immigrant families
and women
Social Gospel Movement
• Church membership increased
dramatically
• Social betterment tied to salvation
• Charles Sheldon (1897)- “What Would
Jesus Do”
Impact on City Government
• Rapid urban growth taxed ability of local
governments to provide services
• Bossism fueled
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Filled void left by fleeing native born groups
Gave jobs, favors to poor and immigrants for votes
Positive: Did help poor and cities
Negative: corruption and offended middle class
Other programs in cities
• Americanize immigrants in public
schools
• Prohibition movement
Life of Middle Class
• Improvements in industry raised the
standard of living for many
• Able to purchase more consumer goods
New Freedoms for Women
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• Image of ideal woman:
Gibson Girl
• Several states granted
women property rights
• Increases in athletic
activity
• Now organizations and
charities
• 1900: 20% of college
grads
Women Continued
• Job opportunities still usually limited to
social services, nursing, teaching
• Comstock Law (1873): access to birth
control information was illegal
• Some economic freedom allowed for
“new morality”
Women’s Suffrage Movement
• Supported by middle class so they
could negate power of immigrant men
– Also take power from corrupt Party Bosses
• Movement picks up steam after Civil
War
– Only Wyoming Territory granted full
political equality to women by 1890
NAWSA
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• Formation of
National American
Woman Suffrage
Assoc. (NAWSA) by
Elizabeth Cady
Stanton and Susan
B. Anthony in 1890
• Need vote to protect
women
Male (and Female) Mobility
• Improved industry meant new careers
demanding education
• Number of public high schools
– 160 in 1870
– 6000 in 1900
• Graduation from college
– 53,000 in 1870
– 101,000 in 1900
Professionalism
• Increased need for lawyers, bankers,
architects, insurance agents, managers
• Protestant Work Ethic
– Horatio Alger
Working Class Hierarchy
• Ethnicity could influence your job
– Native-born protestant whites
– Skilled Western European immigrants
– “New Immigrants”
– African-Americans
Working Class
• Number of unskilled workers growing
and threatening skilled workers
• Gap between rich and poor growing
– Top 10% had 73% of wealth in 1890
– Skilled workers saw wages increase by
50% (1860-1900) but their numbers
decline
– Unskilled saw wages increase 31% (18601900)
Women and children in work
force
• Working class children worked
– 50% of Philadelphia’s children quit school
by 14 in 1900
– 20% of women in work force
• Wages in 1900 for factory worker
– Skilled woman: $5 a week
– Unskilled male: $8 a week
South in Gilded Age
• Still behind the North
• Sharecroppers and Tenant Farmers
dominate the farms
• Most railroads in North which hindered
industrialization
African-Americans
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1900: 44% of non-whites were illiterate
Jim Crow
Plessy v. Ferguson
Post-Reconstruction Redemption
Booker T. Washington
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• Founded Tuskegee
Institute
• Taught black students
trades to gaine selfrespect and economic
security
• Blacks should work
within system and gain
resources that would
lead to Civil Rights
W.E.B. DuBois
• Helped found the
NAACP
• “Talented Tenth”
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