The American Industrial Revolution
1865-1901
Explain the causes of the Industrial Revolution and the important technological and scientific advances
Define:
Identify:
free enterprise
laissez-faire
entrepreneurs
robber barons
tariffs
Alexander Graham Bell
Thomas Alva Edison
William Stanley
George Westinghouse
America’s industrial revolution started in the early 1800s.
Textile mills dotted the Northeast and provided jobs to
women and children. In the Midwest, farming was still the
#1 occupation but cities popped up on bodies of water and
manufacturing lured new workers from farms to these urban
centers. By 1860 1.3 million Americans worked in urban
factories but 29 million still farmed. At the end of the Civil
War in 1865, the nation went from a farming economy to a
growing, urban industrial power.
The Civil War destroyed former Confederate states’
farmland and cities. The South lost 9000 miles of railroads
and 2/3 of its shipping industry. Farms’ value dropped 70%.
In addition, more than 1.5 million free laborers [former
slaves] flooded the labor market. The South was desperate.
However, by 1900, the US changed and became the
world’s leading industrial nation. Reasons for America’s
industrial revolution were: the settlement of the west &
the discovery of natural resources there; a workforce made
up of women, children and immigrants; free enterprise; the
government’s lack of control over industry; & new
inventions like steel, electricity, and oil/ gas engines.
Western Settlement leads to more Natural Resources
The first factor which led the US into a prosperous
industrial revolution was westward expansion, which led to
access to more natural resources. Settlement of America,
west of the Mississippi River, led to the discovery of
abundant natural resources such as: water, timber, coal,
iron, & copper, all of which supported eastern US industry.
These resources meant that US companies could purchase
domestic resources cheaply, many of which were located in
the Rocky and Sierra Nevada mountains. Mining and
lumber industries grew in the west and new railroads made
shipping these resources more efficient and timely.
In 1859 oil was discovered in Pennsylvania and a new
kerosene industry was born. Kerosene is a by-product of
oil. Lanterns and stoves used it. By 1900 US oil fields
expanded to Texas. With the invention of the automobile,
oil became known as ‘liquid gold’ in America, making
millions of dollars for oil barons. Oil became the key
ingredient for economic expansion in America.
The Abundant Workforce of American Industry
A second factor supporting industrialization in the US was a
growing workforce. The US population tripled between
1860 & 1900, largely due to immigration from Eastern
Europe and China. New immigrants migrated here to find a
1
better life. They were the poorest of the poor, uneducated,
and desperate for work.
Between 1870 and 1910, 20 million new immigrants
came to America. Longing to work, they took low paying
jobs & worked long hours in horrible conditions. They
helped businessmen get rich because there were no
government regulations to force them to pay employees fair
wages or work fewer hours or to make the workplace safe.
Free Enterprise
The third factor in America’s industrial rise was free
enterprise, an economic system in which private business
compete with one another, free of government control or
regulations. To support free enterprise businessmen
embraced the idea of laissez-faire, a French phrase
meaning, “let the people do as they choose.” Laissez-faire
said that governments should not interfere in the economy
other than to protect private property rights and maintain
peace. It argued that regulations would increase costs which
would be passed onto consumers and hurt society.
Laissez-faire relies on supply and demand, not the
government, to regulate prices & wages. Supporters felt that
a free market led to more efficiency and created wealth for
everyone. They supported low taxes to make sure that
individuals, not the government, decided how to spend the
nation’s wealth. Entrepreneurs, people who risk their
money to organize and run a business, loved laissez –faire.
Successful and filthy rich entrepreneurs were nicknamed
robber barons by the working class.
Robber barons were capitalists, driven to succeed and
smart enough to seize opportunities to gain large shares of a
profitable enterprise. They used their wealth and power to
fend off political attempts to curb their wealth. Today
robber barons are called "billionaires."
Author, Matthew Josephson, used the term, robber baron,
in his 1934 book, The Robber Barons. He researched the
rise to wealth of several, very rich men and concluded that
their wealth was a product of the sleazy wheeling and
dealing fueled by their greed. Their fortunes were made on
the broken backs of the workforce who were often cheated
of fair pay.
The term "Robber Baron" refers
to industrialists who earned their
fortunes unjustly. These tycoons
of the late 1800s, manipulated the
common people to get rich &
monopolize their industry. They
eliminated the competition
making small fail. Their actions
corrupted industry. Their greed
and power led them to form a new
rich class. Called the American
Aristocracy.
2
Government Lacks Control of Industry
A key factor that helped spur US industrialization was
that federal and state governments had hands off, laissezfaire policies. They literally stayed out of business.
Regulations were not imposed on industry, wages or prices.
Governments said that staying out of business helped it.
Supporters favored free trade and opposed tariffs. A
tariff is a fee on imported goods that an importer must pay
to another country before it can sell its products in that
country. For example, in order to protect American farmers,
tariffs were placed on foreign imports of grain, cotton, and
cattle. The fee increased the price of foreign farm products
so American farmers had lower prices than the imports.
By the late 1800s, the US was one of the largest free
trade areas in the world. Few government regulations
existed to stop the movement of goods across the country.
The US also practiced free trade in labor, placing few
restrictions on immigration.
Eventually tariffs were put on imports but they hurt
Americans in the end. When the US raised tariffs in the
1890s on foreign goods, other countries retaliated by raising
tariffs on American imported goods. US companies with
foreign markets lost business and sales dropped. Farmers
who sold products to Europe watched their market
disappear. Ironically, the problems faced by farmers aided
the industrial revolution. Rural Americans left their farms
to seek employment in urban factories.
New Inventions
The last key factor in helping the US gain industrial
power was the emergence of American inventions, which
helped the nation’s productivity to increase. Improved
communications and transportation was vital to industrial
growth.
One of the most
Bell in
dramatic inventions of
1876
the 19th century in
testing his
communications was the
telephone
telephone.
In
1874
Alexander
Graham
Bell won the patent for a
working telephone in
1876. The following
year, he started the Bell
Telephone Co., now
AT&T, the only provider of telephone service until 1984.
In 1877 Thomas Edison invented the first phonograph,
an early sound-producing machine that recorded and played
sound. By 1880, Edison worked on at least three thousand
different ways to make an efficient incandescent lamp,
which makes light by using electricity to heat a thin strip of
material until it gets hot enough to glow. His long lasting
bulb was patented and he became famous for his light. He
also made the first electric generator, improved the battery,
the Dictaphone voice recorder, the mimeograph copy
machine, and movie machines.
Edison
with his
improved
longlasting
light bulb
In 1882 the Edison Electric Illuminating Company
supplied electricity to NYC. In 1889 the company was
renamed: Edison General Electric [GE].
A rival of Edison’s was George Westinghouse who
challenged Edison’s idea of direct current [DC] to power
electricity. Westinghouse’s alternating current [AC] system
was less bulky, more efficient and transmitted electricity
more safely. AC beat DC
and is used today to
tranmit electricity. He was
the
first
to
run
underground
electric
cables to power his home
in Lenox, Massachusetts
He supplied electricity to
his neighbors, Edith Jones
Wharton, Sara Morgan, &
Lillian Vanderbilt [robber
baron relatives].
William
Stanley,
perfected
the
Alternating
Current
transformer. In 1886,
he installed the first
AC power system in
Great
Barrington,
MA to light up the
town’s
streets
&
homes.
In 1869, Westinghouse improved transportation by
inventing air brakes for railroad cars to make trains stop
safely. The refrigerated railroad car invented in 1877
allowed farmers to transport produce across the country and
keep it fresh.
Inventors and Inventions
1864
George Pullman
sleeping car for trains
1865
Thaddeus Lowe
ice machine
1874
Stephen D. Field
electric streetcar
1879
Thomas Edison
practical use light bulb
Answer the following completely and in depth.
1. List the causes of the industrial revolution and explain each one.
2. How did the term robber baron evolve and why?
3. What were the pros and cons of laissez faire economics to business?
4. What were the pros and cons of tariffs?
5. What important inventions helped the industrial revolution? How?