Social Studies - 2018-19
VUS.8e - Industrialization & Growth of Cities
The student will apply social science skills to understand how the nation grew and changed from the end of Reconstruction through the early twentieth century by
e) evaluating and explaining the social and cultural impact of industrialization, including rapid urbanization;
BIG IDEAS
Unit Themes | Unit Essential Questions |
Equality | Is there one American Experience? |
Economic Systems | To what extent does the American economy shape the American experience? |
Reform Movements | How do people affect change in their society? |
UNDERSTANDING THE STANDARD
During the early twentieth century, America shifted from a primarily rural to an urban society.
ESSENTIALS
Growth of cities
As the nation’s industrial growth continued, cities such as Chicago, Detroit, Cleveland, Pittsburgh, and New York grew rapidly as manufacturing and transportation centers. Factories in the large cities provided jobs, but workers’ families often lived in harsh conditions, crowded into tenements and slums.
The rapid growth of cities caused housing shortages and the need for new public services, such as sewage and water systems and public transportation. Cities in the Northeast, such as Boston and New York, constructed subway systems around the turn of the twentieth century, and many cities built trolley or streetcar lines.
Industrialization: Reputation of capitalists as captains of industry or robber barons
Excesses of the Gilded Age
Income disparity
Lavish lifestyles
Ruthless business practices of capitalists in forming monopolies and trusts
Industrialization: Impact on working conditions for labor
Long hours and low wages, especially for women and children
No job security and no benefits such as workingmen’s compensation
Dangerous working conditions, including the Triangle Shirtwaist Company fire, and work-related illnesses such as lung disease
Company towns
Industrialization: Formation of labor unions
Goals: Higher wages, fewer work hours, safer conditions
Labor organizations
Knights of Labor led by Terence Powderly
American Federation of Labor led by Samuel Gompers
American Railway Union led by Eugene V. Debs
International Ladies’ Garment Workers’ Union
Strikes
Haymarket Square Riot led to the demise of the Knights of Labor
Homestead Strike by Carnegie steel workers
Pullman Strike by railroad workers
Gains
Limited work hours
Regulated working conditions
KEY VOCABULARY
Sherman Anti-Trust Act
Clayton Anti-Trust Act
Price-Fixing
19th Amendment
Income disparity
People
Ida B. Wells
Booker T. Washington
W.E.B. DuBois
Theodore Roosevelt
Woodrow Wilson
Samuel Gompers
Eugene V. Debs
Robber Barons
Progressives
Muckrakers
Knights of Labor
American Federation of Labor
American Railway Union
International Ladies Garment Workers Union
Places
Company town
Court Cases
Plessy v. Ferguson