Chapter 15
The Second Industrial Revolution
Section 1: The Age of Invention
• Between 1865 to 1905 the U.S. experienced a
surge of industrial growth.
• This era altered manufacturing,
transportation, and everyday lives of
Americans.
• Coal & steam made the first revolution
possible.1
• Steel made the second revolution possible.2
Industrial Innovations: Steel
• Before the mid-1800s, the process of
converting iron to steel was too costly.
• Bessemer Process
– Developed by Henry Bessemer and William Kelly
– Method of steelmaking that burned off impurities
in molten iron with a blast of hot air. 1
– Alexander Holley improved the process which led
production to increase from 15,000 tons in 1865
to 28 million tons by 1910.
Industrial Innovations: Steel, cont.
• Increased availability of steel resulted in
widespread industrial use.
– Railroad industry replaced iron rails with stronger,
longer-lasting steel ones.
– Builders used steel in construction of bridges and
buildings. 1
– Steel’s resistance to rust made it an ideal material
for other items: nails and wire
Industrial Innovations: Oil
• Development of a process to refine oil
affected industrial practices.
– Refining crude oil into kerosene, which could be
burned in lamps to produce light or used as a
fuel.1
– Edwin L. Drake realized the demand and used a
steam engine to drill for oil in Pennsylvania.2
– Drake’s success led others to “prospect” for oil.
Industrial Innovations: Oil, cont.
• By 1880 refiners developed other petroleum
products that increased the industrial uses of
oil.
– Waxes and oils for use in industrial machines.
– Elijah McCoy invented a lubricating cup that fed oil
to parts of a machine while running.1
Transportation
• Advances in the steel and oil industries led to
advances in the transportation industry.
– New technologies resulted in expansion of railroad
network.
– New discoveries laid the groundwork for air flight
and the automobile.
– Developments in transportation made travel more
efficient.1
Transportation: Railroad
• Bessemer Process had significant impact on
railroad expansion.1
• Rapid increase of lines led to more efficient
network of rail transportation.
• Transcontinental railroad was completed in
1869.2
• Bigger, more efficient locomotives could pull
larger loads at faster speeds.
Transportation: Railroad, cont.
• Changes in track design improved rail service.1
• Increased western settlement by making travel
more affordable and easy; stimulated urban
growth.2
• Economic impact
– provided many of the country’s jobs
– spurred the growth of other industries
--innovations in refrigerated cars helped to develop
the meat-packing industry
--allowed companies to sell their products nationally.
Transportation: Railroad, cont.
• Shaped American popular culture and folk
music
– Casey Jones, engineer killed in crash with a freight
train in 1900
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=03jwHrO7ubI
– Wabash Cannonball
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nSrEcPdA0hE
Transportation: The Horseless Carriage
• Innovations in oil refining led to advances in
the development of motors and creation of
the horseless carriage.
• Self-propelled vehicle; forerunner to the
automobile.
• Originally developed by a French officer in the
1700s; mounted a steam engine to a threewheeled carriage.1
The Horseless Carriage
Transportation: The Horseless
Carriage, cont.
• Internal combustible engine in 1876.
• By the turn of the century, more Americans
were using carriages in daily life.
• Was limited in use; only wealthy citizens could
afford to use new modes of transportation.
• Automobile production rapidly became a
substantial commercial industry.
Transportation: Airplanes
• Internal combustible engine led to advances in
flight.
• Wright brothers developed one of the first
working airplanes.
– First piloted flight: December 1903, near Kitty
Hawk, NC, 12 seconds and 120 feet
Communication
• Innovations in communication technology
brought Americans into closer contact with
one another.
• Advances furthered the growth of American
industry.
Communications: Telegraph
• Developed by Samuel F.B. Morse
• Communicate over wires with electricity.
• Operator used a dot-and-dash code to send
messages to distance locations within
minutes.
• Grew along with the railroad industry;
telegraph companies established offices in
train stations, and strung wire on poles along
rail lines.
Communications: Telephone
• Patented by Alexander Graham Bell in 1876.
• By the end of the 1800s more than a million
telephones had been installed in American
homes and offices.
• Early telephones required operators to
connect callers; many women filled these jobs.
• Bell Telephone Co. became American
Telephone and Telegraph, one of the nation’s
largest and longest lasting monopolies.
Communications: Typewriter
• Developed by Christopher Sholes in 1867; first
design to be marketed.
• Quickly produced, easily legible documents
revolutionized communications.
• Carbon paper was also introduced during this
time.
• Typing pools
– business depts. made up of clerical workers—mostly
women—whose job it was to type
– offered working class women the opportunity to
move into a skilled profession for the first time.
Thomas Alva Edison
• First major invention: telegraph, could send up to
four messages over the same wire
simultaneously.
• Significant discoveries and advances: electricity,
light bulbs, phonographs, and early motionpicture cameras.
• The “Wizard of Menlo Park” held more than
1,000 patents.
• Work was a team effort, assembled researchers
to deliver inventions on regular basis.
George Westinghouse & Nikola Tesla
• Developed transformer that transmitted highvoltage AC over long distances.
• Developed generator that powered twinkling
lights; symbolized a transformation of
American life.
• Availability of electrical power made possible
other major changes: electric streetcars.
Section 2: The Rise of Big Business:
A New Capitalist Spirit
• Capitalism: private business run most industries, and
competition determines how much goods cost and
workers are paid.
• Laissez-faire: “to let the people do as they choose.”
• Theory of Laissez-faire capitalism: no government
intervention in the economy.
• Free enterprise: economy will prosper if businesses
were left free from government regulation and allowed
to compete in a free market.
• In a free market economy, supply, demand, and profit
margin determine what and how much businesses
produce.
A New Capitalist Spirit: Critics Respond
• Rapid industrialization of factory life was
harmful and unjust to the working class.
• Forcefully argued by Karl Marx, a German
philosopher.
– Proposed a political system that would remove
inequalities of wealth.
– His political theory, Marxism, called for the
overthrow of the capitalist economic system.
A New Capitalist Spirit: Critics
Respond, cont.
• Marx argued that capitalism allowed the
bourgeoisie [people who owned the means of
production] to take advantage of the proletariat
[workers].
• New societies should be formed on the principles
of communism.
• In communist states, property and the means of
production are owned by everyone in the
community. The community provides for the
needs of all the people equally without regard to
social rank.
Social Darwinism
• Adapted from Charles Darwin’s biological
theory of natural selection and evolution.
• Society progressed through natural
competition.
– The “fittest” people, businesses, or nations should
and would rise to positions of wealth and power.
– The “unfit” would fail.
• Any attempts to help the poor or less capable
slowed social progress.
The Corporation
• At the end of the Civil War, businesses were
typically small companies owned by
individuals, families, or partnerships.
– Unable to manage large, new industries such as
oil, steel, and railroads.
– Could not raise money needed to fund such
industries.
The Corporation, cont.
• Business leaders turned to corporations,
where organizers raise money by selling
shares of stock, or certificates of ownership, in
the company.
• Shareholders—those who buy shares—receive
a percentage of the profits, known as
dividends.
The Corporation, cont.
• Advantages
– Can raise large sums of money by selling stock
– Stockholders hold limited liability
– Stable organization
– Public ownership an trading of stock provides a
second source of income.
The Corporation, cont.
• Disadvantages
– More organizational stability to deal with
economic climate. Trusts were formed to deal
with issues of a corporation.1
– When trusts gain exclusive control of an industry,
it holds a monopoly. 2
Carnegie and Steel
• Scottish immigrant; invested earnings in
numerous ventures, which provided the
capital needed to invest in the steel industry.
• Success laid production costs. Employed the
principle of vertical integration, (acquired
companies that provided materials and
services which his enterprise depended on.)
• Philosophy of “Gospel of Wealth.” Donated
much of wealth to charities.
Rockefeller and Oil
• One of the founders of Standard Oil Company.
• Used vertical integration to make his company
more competitive [owned companies that
contributed to each stage of oil refining].
• Main method of expansion was horizontal
integration: one company’s control of other
companies producing same product.
• Forced many rivals to sell out; ruthless business
practices.
• Gave generously to many charities; $550 million
The Railroad Giants:
Cornelius Vanderbilt
• Operated a profitable shipping business before
the Civil War.
• Invested in railroad; gained control of rails in New
York City
• Controlled lines between major cities
• Extended railroad system combining smaller lines
and making them direct routes to urban centers.
• Personal fortune at time of death: $100 million
The Railroad Giants:
George Westinghouse
• Established Westinghouse Air Brake Company
• Compressed-air Brake
– Important safety feature for industry
– Trains could haul more cars and travel at greater
speeds
– Within 5 years 7,000 passenger cars were
equipped with the brake
The Railroad Giants:
George Pullman
• Designed/manufactured rail cars for longdistance travel
• Sleeping cars, dining cars, and luxurious cars
for the wealthy
• Built planned community next to factory to
help poor conditions of city life
• Controlled daily life in community causing
dissatisfaction to grow among workers
Mass Marketing:
Marketing Products
• Companies developed ways of persuading
consumers: brand names and packaging,
brightly colored packages, unique logos.
• Advertising: magazines, newspapers, and
billboards.
• Helped to create consumer culture in U.S.
• Mail-order companies: Montgomery Ward,
and Sears, Roebuck, and Co.
Mass Marketing:
The Department Store
• Variety stores were created to cater to the
demands of the urban market.
• Department stores bought in bulk, offered low
prices to consumers
• Department stores: shopping + jobs = a
WOMAN’S DOMAIN
• Advertising targeted women as customers
Section 3: Labor Strives to Organize
Government and Business
• The U.S. government’s policies concerning
business practices benefitted the
industrialists.
• Government did little to regulate business
practices.
• Government offered little support to the
industrial worker.
The New Working Class
• Demand for labor soared; jobs were mostly
filled by immigrants.
• African Americans
– Moved from the South to find work.
– Some found work in Midwestern and northern
industries, very few in the South
– Industrial employment remained out of reach for
most.
The New Working Class, cont.
• Women and children
– Most women and children worked because the
family needed the money
– Number of workers doubled in this time period
– African American women competed with poor
immigrant women for jobs
Working Conditions
• Labor force faced difficult conditions
– Long hours
– Low wages
– Fatigue made unsafe working conditions more
dangerous
– Company-built towns controlled workers’ lives
outside of work
The Knights of Labor
• National labor union founded by Uriah Stephens
• Membership expanded under Terence V.
Powderly
– Accepted skilled and unskilled laborers
– Fought for temperance, eight-hour workday, equal pay
for equal work, end child labor
• Mary Harris Jones
– “most dangerous woman in America”
– Mother Jones
The Great Upheaval
• 1886: The U.S. experienced intense strikes and
violent labor confrontations
• Workers were more willing to fight for better
working conditions
• Negotiations between workers and
management failed during an economic
depression, causing many violent strikes.
The Great Upheaval:
The Haymarket Riot
• Strike against McCormick Harvesting Machine
Company
• Local union started the strike, then fell under the
leadership of anarchists
• Confrontation with police left two strikers dead
• Held a small, peaceful meeting in Haymarket
Square; police arrived and meeting turned
deadly.
• Eight anarchist arrested and found guilty; four
hanged
Worker Activism Declines
• Employers strike back at workers with
blacklists
• Yellow-dog agreements: workers cannot join
unions
• Lockouts
• Public sentiment turned against workers,
Union membership decreased
Worker Activism Declines, cont.
• American Federation of Labor (AFL)
– Union consisting of skilled laborers only
– Founded by Samuel Gompers in 1886
– Organized independent craft unions in groups that
worked to advance the interests of the workers
The Homestead Strike
-Homestead, PA
-Carnegie Steel company
-Workers protested wage cut
-Managers instituted a lockout, hired guards
to protect plant
-Violent clash led to 16 deaths
The Pullman Strike
-Pullman sleeping-car factory in Pullman, IL
-Went on strike because George Pullman cut wages,
and refused to lower prices at company town
-Eugene V. Debs, head of American Railway Union,
urged other ARU workers to refuse to work or
ride trains
-Workers brought traffic to halt; government
ordered end to strike claiming it a federal offense
-President Cleveland ordered federal troops in;
restored factory operations, strike broken, ARU
destroyed