Overview:"Between 1820 and 1860, the visual map of the United States was transformed by unprecedented urbanization and rapid territorial expansion. These changes mutually fueled the Second Industrial Revolution which peaked between 1870 and 1914. Between the annexation of Texas (1845), the British retreat from Oregon country, and The Treaty of Guadalupe-Hidalgo (1848) which cemented Mexican cession of the Southwest to the United States, territorial expansion exponentially rewrote the competing visions free-soilers, European immigrants, industrial capitalists, and Native Americans held for the future of the American Empire."
To read more, click on the link below from U.S. History Scene: |
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Emergence of Railroads
As the push for industrialism increased throughout America, there was an equally important need for transportation of raw and finished goods. The emergence of railroads transformed the way in which America was able to compete in a global marketplace, and be able to connect the east and west coasts. You can read more about the impact of railroads on the development of the industrial United States by clicking below:
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Big Business and Monopolies
Although the Industrial Revolution appeared to affect all aspects of American society, only a select few people were benefiting the most from these changes. Through accumulating smaller companies together, owners were able to establish monopolies on certain franchises such as oil, steel, and railroads. This was done either through Vertical Integration, where one person or group owns all the different companies that work on one product, or through Horizontal Integration, where one person or group owns all of one industry type. You can read more about these monopoly owners in the links below:
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The Progressive Era
Many far-reaching economic and social changes transformed American society in the 20th century, including innovations in science and technology, economic productivity, mass communication and mass entertainment, health and living standards, the role of government, gender roles, and conceptions of freedom.
To continue reading, click on the link below: |
Impacts of IndustrializationWhen assessing the ways in which Industrialization changed the American landscape, it is impossible to overlook the negative consequences that resulted as well as the positive. Incidents such as the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire highlighted the lack of care for the safety of employees, as many lost their lives in similar unsafe and unregulated work facilities. As events continued to unfold negatively from industrialization, people decided to take action. Upton Sinclair decided to write about the atrocities taking place in factories, which was published in "The Jungle," and Ida Tarbell wrote on the malpractices of the Rockefeller Oil tycoon. It was only after "muckrakers" like Sinclair and Tarbell spoke out that the government decided to step in and direct these companies.
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How Did the FBI Get Started?When J. Edgar Hoover started the Federal Bureau of Investigation, he may not have known how important his branch of the government was going to become. Explore the start of the FBI with the link below: |
Are there still monopolies today?
As we compare what took place in the past with how poorly monopolies were run in the early 1900s, we should still ask ourselves; where are we today? Are monopolies still around? Are they better than before? Do they help or hurt America? Take some time to read about the different monopoly issues that have recently come up in the different links below: |
Links on Modern Monopolies:
Women's Suffrage
"The women’s suffrage movement was a decades-long fight to win the right to vote for women in the United States. It took activists and reformers nearly 100 years to win that right, and the campaign was not easy: Disagreements over strategy threatened to cripple the movement more than once. But on August 26, 1920, the 19th Amendment to the Constitution was finally ratified, enfranchising all American women and declaring for the first time that they, like men, deserve all the rights and responsibilities of citizenship." -History.com
Interactive History of Women's Suffrage |
Crash Course: Women's Suffrage |
Primary Sources from the Era |