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The Gilded Age

The Gilded Age. “What is the chief end of man? To get rich. In what way? Dishonestly if we can; honestly if we must ." Mark Twain (1871) . Five Major Themes :. Opening of the West Immigration & Urbanization Industrialization Politics – Corruption & Reform Labor Movements.

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The Gilded Age

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  1. The Gilded Age “What is the chief end of man? To get rich. In what way? Dishonestly if we can; honestly if we must." Mark Twain (1871)

  2. Five Major Themes: • Opening of the West • Immigration & Urbanization • Industrialization • Politics – Corruption & Reform • Labor Movements

  3. Pacific Railway Act (1862) • charters two transcontinental RR lines • Union Pacific • Central Pacific • provided for federal subsidies (government money)… public land • immigrant labor

  4. Labor • Central Pacific crews consisted primarily of Chinese workers • White workers usually earned $40-60 per month for ten hour days, plus meals • Chinese workers earned $35 per month for dawn to dusk hours, provided own food • Snow was frequently so deep (up to 40 feet), they would tunnel into it to live and work • Union Pacific workers were primarily Civil War vets and Irishmen • Hell on Wheels

  5. Promontory Point Utah, May 10, 1869

  6. Conquest of the Western Indians • “The white children have surrounded me and have left me nothing but an island” -Sioux Chief Red Cloud, 1870 • -”permanent Indian country”?

  7. Why the urgent need for a railroad? • Why was there such an urgent need for a transcontinental railroad in the late 1800s? What motivations existed for its creation, and the governments willingness to spend so much money to connect California to the Midwest/East Coast? • Write down at least two motivations, and why they were so important

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