WEGAI - Westward Expansion, the Gilded Age and Industrialization Key Concepts (Lesson)
Westward Expansion, the Gilded Age, and Industrialization
Before you begin...
Notes are given here as well as in the Readings Document from Boundless that is available to download below. There are three presentations to view as well.
The Key Concepts lesson is very important as it covers the main areas of the Advanced Placement frameworks and the Georgia Performance Standards. Many of the test questions will relate to items found here. Many of the test questions will relate to items found here.
Boundless: PDF of readings for this module Links to an external site.
Key Concepts:
Download the key concepts questions that are found below and answer these as you read and view the information in the module. The answers are found in the text on this and the following pages, the readings, the online textbook links, and in the presentation. After you have done this, you will use these answers to review for the multiple-choice test for this module.
Download your Key Concepts Questions here. Links to an external site.
Railroads
The federal government granted vast areas of western land to railroad owners so they would lay train tracks connecting the eastern and western states.
Railroad construction was very expensive, and the federal government could not afford to build railroads on a large scale; so government officials enlisted the help of private investors and railroad companies.
To complete this heavy work, the owners relied mainly on Chinese labor. These Asian immigrants accepted lower pay than other laborers demanded. The work was dangerous. Many Chinese laborers died in the explosive blasts they ignited to clear the path across the railroad companies' land. Many others died under rockslides and heavy snowfalls before the first transcontinental railroad was completed in 1869. The Central Pacific built track from west to east and the Union Pacific from east to west and the two ends met in Promontory, Utah.
The railroad companies contributed to the development of the West by selling low-cost parcels of their western land for farming. Settlers traveled west on the trains to farm on the fertile soil. Western farmers used the trains to ship their grain east and Western cattle ranchers shipped their steers to eastern butchers. Both farmers and ranchers sold their goods to people they could not easily reach without railroads. The railroads earned money by transporting the settlers west and the goods east.
Steel
The growth of American railroads helped expand the industries that supplied the railroad companies' need for steel rails laid on wood ties, iron locomotives burning huge quantities of coal, wooden freight cars, and passenger cars with fabric-covered seats and glass windows. The railroads were the biggest customers for the steel industry because thousands of miles of steel track were laid. In turn, the railroads had a great impact on the steel industry. To supply their biggest customers, steel producers developed cheap, efficient methods for the mass production of steel rails. These low-cost methods enabled more industries to afford the steel companies' products.
The rapid rise of the steel and railroad industries between the end of the Civil War and the early 1900s spurred the growth of other big businesses, especially in the oil, financial, and manufacturing sectors of the economy. These big businesses acquired enormous financial wealth. They often used this wealth to dominate and control many aspects of American cultural and political life, and by the beginning of the 20th century, as a result of these practices, big business became the target of government reform movements at the state and national levels.
Oil
Oil companies grew swiftly in this period, most notably the Standard Oil Company founded by John D. Rockefeller. Standard Oil was the most famous big business of the era. Rockefeller also gained control of most other oil companies and created what is called a trust. By means of a trust, Rockefeller came to own more than 90% of America's oil industry. Standard Oil thus became a monopoly - a single company that controlled virtually all the U.S. oil production and distribution.
Electricity
The effects of technological advances made after Reconstruction forever changed how people lived. The most famous inventor of the period is Thomas Edison. He invented the light bulb, the phonograph, motion pictures, a system for distributing electrical power, and many other technologies powered by electricity. Edison also established the concept of industrial research and founded a research laboratory staffed by engineers and technicians in New Jersey.
Edison's technological achievements were used by other inventors as evidenced by the development of long-distance electricity transmission that enabled Edison's electric light to illuminate buildings, streets, and neighborhoods across the United States. Electricity soon replaced steam as the source of power for factories. It replaced horses as the means to power streetcars. Of greatest impact, perhaps, was electricity's replacing humans as the source of power for household appliances. Edison's inventions eliminated much manual labor that had been associated with everyday household activities and improved Americans' quality of life.
Reforms in the Gilded Age
On a national level from 1870 until 1896, the absence of clear mandates from the citizenry caused presidents to be courageous and innovative in their initiatives—as a group, presidents in this period maintained the status quo to keep the more traditional-minded voters content.
As a result, for the last quarter of the 19th century, presidents had a weak hold on power, and members of Congress were reluctant to tie their political agendas to weak presidents.
Moreover, less-than-strong presidents were more likely to support various legislators’ and lobbyists’ agendas because they owed favors to their political parties and to important financial supporters who helped them gain the bare minimum of votes to win office through the Electoral College.
As a result of these entanglements and “debts,” there were few bills passed and those were mainly responses to the requests of businessmen and industrialists whose support helped politicians stay in office.
What were the consequences of this “political doldrum?” Almost nothing was accomplished on the federal level in the period; however, problems caused by the exponential economic growth in the last quarter of the century continued to build up.
More Americans were moving to urban centers--which were unable to accommodate the massive numbers of working poor flooding the cities.
Tenement houses with horrendous sanitation issues led to widespread illness.
In rural America, people lived in conditions that were no better than in the urban areas. Farmers were unable to make a living with the challenges of low prices for their crops and rising costs for everyday items.
Nationwide, Americans needed remedies for their daily struggles and they increasingly looked to fractured, corrupt political groups for assistance since the federal government seemed unable or unwilling to help working-class Americans.
Find out more in the presentation below.
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