Things you will learn:
What does the term “gilded” mean?
What natural resources were key to
U.S. industrialization?
How did inventions in the period
effect business and social life?
Industry in the “Gilded” Age
Natural
Resources
Oil:
• used for lamps,
machinery
• Begin to use steam drill
by Edwin Drake to get out
of ground
• Drill in KY, OH, IL, IN
Iron Ore:
• used to make steel
• use coal fires to burn
carbon out and make
steel
Coal:
• used for fires to
power steam engines
on trains, fires to make
steel, heat homes
• Mined in WV, PA,
OH, IN, IL
Steel:
•William Kelly & Bessemer
Process
• uses: RRs, barbed wire,
farm machinery, bridges,
skyscrapers
Inventions
Typewriter:
Electricity:
• Thomas Edison
• Christopher Sholes/ James
Densmore
• Perfected light bulb
• Sped up / standardized
communication
• Power grid
• Uses:
Factories
streetcars
appliances
Telephones:
• Alex Graham Bell
Creates clerical
jobs for white
single women
• Speeded communication / rate
of business
Things you will learn:
• Who were the major business leaders
of the Gilded Age and what were their
business strategies?
• How were these men regarded
differently by different interest groups?
‘Big Wigs’ of the Gilded Age
What is the strategy to
win at the game of
monopoly?
Carnegie
US Steel
Practices:
Quality Control
Cost Control / accounting
Stock incentives for
managers
Vertical Integration:
buying out your suppliers
J.P. Morgan
RRds & bought US
Steel
Practices:
Holding Companies:
Companies that are
formed only to buy
up other companies
Pullman
Railroad Cars
Practices:
Company town:
The company owns the
land, houses, churches,
and schools around a
factory.
Have great control over
workers
Rockefeller
Standard Oil
Trusts / Price fixing:
Companies in the same industry
band together, drop prices, &
drive out competitors.
Then raise prices artificially high
RRd. Kickbacks:
He would get rebates from RRd
companies, they pass cost onto
farmers
Vanderbilt
Duke
Railroads
Tobacco
Consolidation:
Made all RR tracks
the same in width,
then bought out all
his competitors
(horizontal
integration)
Advertising / Label
Leveraging:
Developed a label“Bull Durham.”
Advertise it / creates
demand.
Wouldn’t let other
brands be sold if his
was sold there.
Competing Philosophies
Are these men heroic or evil?
Heroic: “Captains of Industry”
Evil: “Robber Barons”
Horatio Alger Stories: “Rags to
riches” tales of young men who
succeed due to their own efforts
/ character
These men use unethical
practices to squash out their
competition and overcharge
common people.
Social Darwinism: “These men
are better and deserve their
wealth”.
Belief in this idea led to people
wanting the government to stop
the “Robber Barons”
“Survival of the fittest” is the
natural process of natural
selection.
Definition: A ‘gang’ of people
who controlled city governments
for their own profit and self
interest.
Political Machines
How They Got Money:
Graft / Padding Bills:
Overcharge taxpayers to build
stuff for the gov’t. The builders
and machine members split
the extra $.
Bribes: Gov’t officials would
accept bribes for licenses, not
doing inspections, etc. The
officials would “kick back”
some of the money to the
machine
Organizational Structure:
Party Boss
Ward Bosses
Precinct captains
Common People
Businessmen
who want gov’t
contracts
How They Got Votes:
Immigrants: The machine members gave
them jobs / arranged housing…then took
them to vote
Padding Lists / fraud: Machine members
use dead people’s names, dogs,
imaginary people…and add them to the
list of registered voters and then vote
them illegally
Example:
Tammany Hall /
Democratic
Headquarters
Of NYC
Boss Tweed
Political boss
of NYC
Exposing Machines & Corruption
Thomas Nast: a cartoonist exposed
political machines through his drawings.
Most poor people couldn’t read well.
Raised awareness among the common
people of why political machines were bad
Reform in the Gilded Age
You will learn:
- What the rich and poor wanted in regards to
tariff, monetary and civil service reform.
- Which reform movements succeeded and which
ones failed.
Tariff Reform
What is a tariff?
Taxes on imported goods
Tariff Reform
• What do the rich want – a high or low
tariff?
– HIGH
• WHY?
– So the goods they produce won’t have to
compete with foreign made goods.
Tariff Reform
• Relevant Presidents:
– Cleveland –
• Democrat
• tried to lower tariff. No success.
– Harrison –
• Republican
• Raised to 48%
Tariff Reform:
Relevant Presidents (cont’d.)
– Cleveland (term 2)
• Lowered to 41% (Wilson Gorman tariff)
– McKinley
• Republican
• Raised tariff back to 46% (Dingley tariff)
Tariff Reform: Result
• Sooooo . . . . .
• In the end was the tariff:
– HIGH or LOW ??????
– High.
• Did tariff reform succeed or fail?
– Tariff reform fails.
• Who’s happy?
– Rich people.
Monetary Reform
• Monetary reform has to do with . . . .
– Money, currency
• What has been the poor people’s
complaint about the money supply since
1792?
– Too little money is being printed
What do the poor want?
• More money printed
• Bimetallism
What do the rich want?
• Stable currency
• The gold standard
Monetary Reform
• Relevant Presidents:
– No president is ever elected that fully
supports bimetallism.
– In 1900, McKinley passes the Gold Standard
Act.
Monetary Reform
• Soooo. . . . .
• Does monetary reform succeed or fail?
– Monetary reform fails.
• Who’s happy?
– The rich.
Civil Service Reform
• What are civil servants?
– Government employees.
– Were these good or bad jobs back then?
– What is the spoils system?
– What’s another word for the spoils system?
• patronage
Civil Service Reform
• Do the common people like or dislike the
spoils system? Why?
– They want to end the spoils system.
– Want qualified people who are not corrupt
being paid by taxpayer dollars.
Civil Service Reform
• Do the rich like or dislike the spoils
system?
– They like the spoils system.
– Allows them to control government with their
$.
– Oppose reform – called Stalwarts.
Civil Service Reform
• Relevant presidents:
– Hayes supports it.
• No Congressional support.
– Garfield starts reform.
– Is assassinated by a Stalwart.
• His VP, Chester Arthur, was a stalwart.
– Arthur turns into a reformer!
• Passes the Pendleton Act.
– Limits the jobs a new president can fire / hire for
– Requires civil service exams of government employees.
Civil Service Reform
• Soooo…..
• Does Civil Service Reform succeed or fail?
• Succeeds!
• Who’s happy?
The poor!