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Unveiling The Gilded Age: Troubles and Triumphs of an Era

Explore the Economic and Social Problems during The Gilded Age - a period post-Civil War till the early 20th century, marked by urban decay, corrupt politicians, business corruption, poor working conditions, child labor, and the rise of social darwinism. Discover the struggles and realities faced by society during this transformative era.

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Unveiling The Gilded Age: Troubles and Triumphs of an Era

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  1. The Protectors of Our Industries-APPARTS ANALYSIS

  2. Economic and Social Problems The Industrial Age (The Gilded Age)

  3. What was the Gilded Age? • the Industrial Age following the Civil War, from the end of Reconstruction in 1877 to the turn of the twentieth century. • The term was coined by writers Mark Twain and Charles Dudley Warner in The Gilded Age: A Tale of Today, satirizing what they believed to be an era of serious social problems hidden by a thin layer of gold.

  4. 1. Urban Decay • Overcrowded cities, high crime, gang fights, violence, drug addiction (cocaine) • Cities not equipped to deal with overcrowding • Not enough police, fire fighters, hospitals • Poor housing- tenements decrepit • No sewage or garbage removal • Rats, disease, and roaches everywhere • Polluted drinking water

  5. Real Gangs of New York

  6. TENEMENTS WERE APARTMENT BUILDINGS WITH MANY SMALL ROOMS WHERE WHOLE FAMILIES WOULD LIVE, CROWDED TOGETHER WITHOUT ADEQUATE AIR, WATER OR SANITARY FACILITIES

  7. “Dumbell” Tenement, NYC

  8. “Dumbell “ Tenement

  9. Jacob Riis: How the Other Half Lived(1890)

  10. Video clip on Jacob Riis and Colonel Waring sanitation problems- (7:28-until Cities Part 3-4) photographer on tenement conditions

  11. “5 CENTS A SPOT” THE PRICE FOR A BED FOR THE NIGHT by Jacob Riis

  12. 2. Corrupt Politicians • Political machines- controlled almost every major city • Politicians did favors and helped the poor in return for votes, accepted bribes • Elections were “fixed”, votes stolen, miscounted, false ballots, dead people “voting” • Tammany Hall- the most famous and corrupt political machine-led by the corrupt Boss William Tweed

  13. The New York County Courthouse- “the house that Tweed built”

  14. 3. Business Corruption • Business Mergers- several companies were combining into single mega-companies to form monopolies ( 1 business with complete control over an industry) • Social Darwinism- big businesses believed it was OK for the larger businesses to crush the smaller businesses (survival of the fittest and strongest)

  15. Social Darwinism • British economist. • Advocate of laissez-faire. • Adapted Darwin’s ideas from the “Origin of Species” to humans. • Notion of “Survival of the Fittest.” Herbert Spencer

  16. Social Darwinism in America • Individuals must have absolute freedom to struggle, succeed or fail. • Therefore, government intervention to reward society and the economy is futile! William Graham SumnerFolkways (1906)

  17. New Business Culture:“The American Dream?” Protestant (Puritan) “Work Ethic” • Horatio Alger [100+ novels] Is the idea of the “self-made man” a MYTH??

  18. New Type of Business Entities Trusts- 2 types: • Horizontal Integration (more common- trying to gain control of the entire market by buying out competing companies) John D Rockefeller • Vertical Integration: (US STEEL controlling all aspects of production, the raw materials like buying out coal fields and iron mines) • Gustavus Swift  Meat-packing • Andrew Carnegie U. S. Steel

  19. Standard Oil Co.

  20. Robber Barons-many of the big business owners were called this by those who criticized them

  21. The Gospel of Wealth:Religion in the Era of Industrialization • Wealth no longer looked upon as bad. • Viewed as a sign of God’s approval. • Christian duty to accumulate wealth. • Government should not help the poor. Russell H. Conwell

  22. “On Wealth” • The Anglo-Saxon race is superior. • “Gospel of Wealth” (1901). • Inequality is inevitable and good. • Wealthy should act as “trustees” for their “poorer brethren.” • Carnegie gave away 90% of his fortune to help society Andrew Carnegie

  23. 4. Poor Working Conditions • Workers in the factories faced with 12-16 hour work days, horrible and unsafe working conditions, little pay • Workers went on strike and even sometimes rioted for better working conditions • Workers formed Labor Unions to fight for more control over pay and working conditions • Child labor- little children worked long hours, under dangerous conditions, no child labor laws

  24. Child working in a Clothing Factory around 1900

  25. Children working the steel mills in Pittsburgh

  26. Young Boys working in at a textile mill

  27. Triangle Waistefactory Fire video clip (Cities episode 4-5; 7:18-

  28. Triangle Shirtwaist FactoryAsch Building, 8th and 10th Floors

  29. Typical NYC Sweatshop, 1910

  30. Inside the Building After the Fire

  31. 10th Floor After the Fire

  32. Dead Bodies on the Sidewalk

  33. Scene at the Morgue

  34. JOHN SPARGO-CHILD LABOR John Spargo was a British reformer who moved to the United States in 1901. He became an influential muckraker with the publishing of his book The Bitter Cry of the Children in 1906. The book detailed the plight of working children. “Work in the coal breakers is exceedingly hard and dangerous. Crouched over the chutes, the boys sit hour after hour, picking out the pieces of slate and other refuse from the coal as it rushes past to the washers. From the cramped position they have to assume, most of them become more or less deformed and bent-backed like old men… The coal is hard, and accidents to the hands, such as cut, broken, or crushed fingers, are common among the boys. Sometimes there is a worse accident: a terrified shriek is heard, and a boy is mangled and torn in the machinery, or disappears in the chute to be picked out later smothered and dead. Clouds of dust fill the breakers and are inhaled by the boys, laying the foundations for asthma and miners’ consumption.”

  35. Big Business and Child Labor Cartoon

  36. “Galley Labor”

  37. Upton Sinclair’s “The Jungle” exposed unsanitary conditions (rats, roaches, maggots, etc.) in the meatpacking factories Muckrakers- journalists who exposed society’s “muck” and corruption 5. Unsafe Food

  38. THE MUCKRAKERS Upton Sinclair Lincoln Steffens Jacob Riis Ida Tarbell

  39. UPTON SINCLAIR MOVIE MADE FROM THE BOOK IN THE EARLY 1900’S HIS BOOK, THE JUNGLE DESCRIBED THE FILTHY CONDITIONS IN THE MEAT PACKING INDUSTRY AND LED TO THE PASSAGE OF THE FEDERAL MEAT INSPECTION ACT OF 1906

  40. EXCERPT FROM THE JUNGLE “…old sausage that had been rejected, and that was moldy and white – it would be dosed with borax and glycerin, and dumped into the hoppers, and made over again for home consumption. There would be meat that had tumbled out on the floor, in the dirt and sawdust, where the workers had tramped and spit uncounted billions of consumption germs. There would be meat stored in great piles in rooms; and the water from leaky roofs would drip over it, and thousands of rats would race about on it. It was too dark in these storage places to see well, but a man could run his hand over these piles of meat and sweep off handfuls of the dried dung of rats. These rats were nuisances, and the packers would put poisoned bread out for them; they would die, and then rats, bread, and meat would go into the hoppers together… the meat would be shoveled into carts, and the man who did the shoveling would not trouble to lift out a rat even when he saw one – there were things that went into the sausage in comparison with which a poisoned rat was a tidbit.”

  41. 6. Social and Economic Inequality • The days of the Jim Crow Laws continued for blacks especially in the south • Wealth in the hands a few- in 1900, 1% of the US population owned 90% of the country’s wealth • Only 7% of the adult population had a high school diploma in 1900. • Only 25% of Americans owned a home • Women still could not vote • Women sought universal suffrage (the right to vote for all)

  42. Woman’s Suffrage Movement

  43. STATES THAT GAVE WOMEN THE SUFFRAGE BEFORE THE 19TH AMENDMENT

  44. THE STRUGGLE FOR WOMEN’S SUFFRAGE

  45. NOT ALL WOMEN WERE IN FAVOR OF VOTING

  46. AFRICAN AMERICANS FACED MANY HARDSHIPS • THE MAJORITY WERE POOR • THEY LIVED FOR THE MOST PART IN THE SOUTHERN STATES • THEY WORKED AS TENANT FARMERS AND HIRED HANDS ON SOMEONE ELSE'S LAND • JIM CROW LAWS SEVERELY RESTRICTED THEIR FREEDOM • DE JURE SEGREGATION WAS IN FORCE • PLESSEY V FERGUSON (“ SEPARATE BUT EQUAL”) WAS THE RULE • BLACK SCHOOLS WERE INFERIOR TO WHITE SCHOOLS • BLACKS HAD NO CONTROL OVER LOCAL POLITICS EVEN WHERE THEY WERE THE MAJORITY

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