Friday 1/5/07 Introduction to the “Gilded Age”: the Impact of Industrialization


Tues. 1/9/07 ROBBER BARONS OR CREATIVE ENTREPRENEURS?

Due: pp. 648-655, plus 686-689

Terms:

Centennial Exposition of 1876
Thomas Alva Edison
Wilbur and Orville Wright
Vertical integration
Horizontal combination
Andrew Carnegie
Social Darwinism
Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC)
Pendleton Civil Service Reform Act 1883

Questions to guide your reading:

1. What were the major factors that led to the tremendous industrial boom in the years after the Civil War?

2. Why did this boom also create such huge businesses?

3. What were the major tenets of the Gospel of Wealth?

4. Why did the federal government expand so greatly by 1865?

5. What role did the political parties play in the process of government? Was the system able to make the necessary reforms? Did enough reform get accomplished or did the system insure that critically needed reforms were so thoroughly watered down that no serious changes occurred?

6.Explain how a prominent reformer such as James Garfield might become a leading “machine” politician.



THURSDAY 1/11/07 THE LABOR MOVEMENT

Due:
1) Turn in the sheet that indicates what kind of interview you want to complete for the Oral History Project.

2) Read pp. 656-663, 740 (from Company towns) -743 (to “Bohemian) plus documents that are located on these two websites:

“West Virginia’s Mine Wars” at
http://www.wvculture.org/hiStory/minewars.html

and “I Will Kill Frick” by Emma Goldman at
http://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/99/

Terms:
Chinese Exclusion Act
Knights of Labor
American Federation of Labor (AFL)
Industrial Workers of the World (IWW)

Questions to guide your reading:
1. How did the rapid growth of industrialization change the nature of work?

2. Describe the unsafe conditions that existed at many factories.

3. How did the Knights of Labor compare to the American Federation of Labor in its goals, membership and success in achieving its goals?

4. How did the rise of industry affect the lives of rural Southerners? How does southern industry remain largely “extractive” and rural?

5. How did African-Americans fit into the newly industrialized economy in the north and the south? What kinds of jobs did they get? How are they treated on the job? How do unions respond to them?

6. Describe the typical “company town” in the Piedmont communities.

7. Be familiar with the working conditions of mining towns like Ludlow, Colorado.(p. 740)


TUESDAY 1/16/07 THE IMMIGRANT EXPERIENCE

Due: read pp. 736 (from “working class”-740 (company towns)
plus pp. 663-677

Terms:

Triangle Shirtwaist fire
tenements
“conspicuous consumption”
Booker T. Washington

Questions to guide your reading:

1. Be able to compare the experiences of the “new immigrants” from Europe with those from Mexico and Japan in the late 19th Century.

2. How did cities change in economy, population and urban space in the decades after the Civil War?

3. Why did immigrants tend to settle in some regions and not in others? See Map 19-2.

4. How did developments of urban transportation affect the growth of cities?

5. Describe the lives of the “new” middle class in the late 19th century.

6. How did immigrant communities preserve some old world customs?

7. How did the education system change to prepare children for their adult roles in the new industrial economy? How did women’s educational opportunities change?

8. How did people in the cities spend their leisure time?

THURS. 1/18/07 "THE MIRROR WITH THE MEMORY"

Due: read Ch. 9, in After the Fact, “The Mirror with the Memory”


MON. 1/22/07 STATUS OF AFRICAN-AMERICANS AFTER RECONSTRUCTION

Due: read pp. 700-703, 746 from “Racism..”-748 to “National Progressivism” plus 2 documents:

1) Booker T. Washington, “Cast Down Your Bucket” at http://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/88.
2) W.E.B. Dubois, “The Talented Tenth” read only through the paragraph that begins "All men cannot go to college but some men must" at
http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/index.asp?document=174

Terms:
nativism
American Protective Association
Jim Crow laws
Plessy v. Ferguson
“Grandfather clauses”
poll taxes
Ida B. Wells
Tom Watson
“talented tenth”
Niagara Movement
NAACP

Questions to guide your reading:

1. Describe the various ways in which African-Americans experienced discrimination and violence in the south in the late 19th Century.

2. How did racism permeate American culture?

3. What were the main ideas of Booker T. Washington?

4. How did WEB DuBois criticize Booker T. Washington?

WED 1/24/07 UNIT TEST: THE GILDED AGE