Chapter 13
Copyright © by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc
Chapter 13 Section 1
end
I. Technology and Industry (Pages 386–389)
A. Industrialization changed the way Americans worked, traveled, and communicated. In
the North, manufacturers made products by dividing tasks among workers. They built
factories to bring specialized workers together. Products could be made more quickly.
The factory workers used machinery to do some of the work faster and more efficiently.
B. Mass production of cotton textiles began in New England after Elias Howe invented
the sewing machine in 1846. By 1860 factories in the Northeast produced about two thirds
of the country’s manufactured goods.
C. Advances in transportation sparked the success of many new industries.
1. Robert Fulton’s steamboat, developed in 1807, enabled goods and passengers to
move along the inland waterways more cheaply and quickly.
2. Thousands of miles of roads and canals were built between 1800 and 1850,
connecting many lakes and rivers.
3. Canal builders widened and deepened the canals in the 1840s so steamboats could
pass through. Steamboats created the growth of cities such as Chicago, Cincinnati,
and Buffalo.
4. Clipper, or sailing, ships were built in the 1840s to go faster, almost as fast as
steamships. They could travel an average of 300 miles per day.
5. Railroad growth in the 1840s and 1850s connected places that were far apart. Early
railroads connected mines with nearby rivers. Horses, not locomotives, powered
the early railroads.
a. The first steam-powered locomotive, the Rocket, began operating in Britain in
1829.
b. Peter Cooper designed and built the first American steam locomotive, Tom
Thumb, in 1830.
6. A railway network in 1860 of nearly 31,000 miles of track linked cities in the North
and Midwest. Railway builders tied the eastern lines to lines built farther west so
that by 1860, a network united the East and the Midwest.
7. Railways transformed trade and settlement in the nation’s interior. With the Erie
Canal and railway network between the East and West, grain, livestock, and dairy
products moved directly from the Midwest to the East. Prices were lower because
goods traveled faster and more cheaply. People settled into Ohio, Indiana, and
Illinois, and as the population of the states grew, new towns and industry developed
in the Midwest.
D. People needed to communicate faster to keep up with the industrial growth and faster
travel methods. Samuel Morse developed the telegraph in 1844. It used electric signals
to send messages along wires. To transmit messages, Morse developed the Morse
code, using a series of dots and dashes to represent the letters of the alphabet. By 1860
the United States had constructed more than 50,000 miles of telegraph lines.
II. Agriculture (Page 390)
A. Farmers were able to sell their products in new markets as a result of the railroads and
canals.
B. New inventions changed farming methods and also encouraged settlers to develop
larger areas in the West thought to be too difficult to farm.
1. John Deere invented the steel-tipped plow in 1837. Its steel-tipped blade cut
through hard soil more easily than previous plows, which used wood blades.
2. The mechanical reaper sped up harvesting wheat. Cyrus McCormick designed and
constructed it and made a fortune manufacturing and selling it. The mechanical
reaper harvested grain four times faster than men using handheld sickles. Farmers
began planting more wheat because they could harvest it faster. Growing wheat
became profitable.
3. The thresher separated the grain from the stalk.
C. Midwestern farmers grew large quantities of wheat and shipped it east. Farmers in the
Northeast and Middle Atlantic states increased production of fruits and vegetables
because they grew well in Eastern soil.
D. Agriculture was not a mainstay of the North. Farming the rocky soil was difficult.
Instead, the North continued to grow industrially. More and more people worked in
factories, and the problems connected with factory labor also grew.
Copyright © by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc
Chapter 13, Section 2
end
I. Northern Factories (Pages 391–393)
A. Factories produced items such as shoes, watches, guns, sewing machines, and agricultural
machinery in addition to textiles and clothing. Working conditions worsened as factories
grew. Employees worked an average 11.4-hour day, often under dangerous and unpleasant
conditions. No laws existed to regulate working conditions or to protect workers.
B. By the 1830s workers began to organize to improve working conditions. Trade unions,
or organizations of workers with the same trade or skill, developed. Unskilled workers
also organized due to poor working conditions.
C. Skilled workers in New York City went on strike or refused to work in the mid-1830s.
They hoped for higher wages and a 10-hour day. They formed the General Trades
Union of New York.
D. Striking was illegal and workers could be punished by law or fired from their jobs. A
Massachusetts court ruled in favor of workers’ right to strike in 1842, but this was just
the beginning of workers receiving legal rights.
E. Although the North did not have slavery in the 1820s, it did have racial prejudice and
discrimination. In 1820, although New York stopped requiring white men to own
property in order to vote, few African Americans could vote. In fact, Rhode Island and
Pennsylvania passed laws prohibiting free African Americans from voting.
1. Free African Americans were not allowed to attend public schools and were barred
from public facilities. They were forced into segregated schools and hospitals in
most communities.
2. A few African Americans were successful in business. Most though were
extremely poor.
F. Women were discriminated against in the mills and factories even though they played
a major role in the development of industry. They worked for less pay, were excluded
from unions, and were kept out of the workplace to make more jobs for men.
1. The Lowell Female Labor Reform Organization in Massachusetts petitioned the
state legislature for a 10-hour day in 1845. The legislature did not even consider
the petition signed only by women.
2. Most early efforts in the workplace failed but did set the stage for later women’s
movements.
II. The Rise of Cities (Pages 393–395)
A. People moved to the cities to fill the factory jobs. In 1860 the population of New York
City, the nation’s largest city, reached one million. Philadelphia had more than 500,000
people. City life was often difficult and dangerous due to overcrowding, run-down
buildings, and the threat of disease and fire.
B. Immigration to the United States greatly increased between 1840 and 1860. Many of
these people were willing to work for low pay and long hours.
1. The largest group came from Ireland, more than 1.5 million, settling mainly in the
Northeast. A potato famine, or an extreme shortage, caused by a potato disease
destroyed Ireland’s crops, and starvation followed. Potatoes were the staple food
of the Irish diet.
2. The men from Ireland worked in factories or did manual labor such as working on
the railroads and digging ditches. Women became servants and factory workers.
3. The second-largest group of immigrants came from Germany. They settled in New
York, Pennsylvania, the Midwest, and the western territories. Some came for new
opportunity, and others came as a result of the failure of the democratic revolution
in 1848. More than one million came, most of them men. Many had money, so they
prospered, founding their own communities and organizations and buying farms
or setting up businesses.
C. Immigration changed the character of the country. People brought their language,
customs, religion, and ways of life. Most of the Irish immigrants and about one-half
of German immigrants were Roman Catholics. They settled in northeastern cities.
The church gave them a source of spiritual guidance and also provided a center for
community life.
D. The immigrants faced prejudice. Anti-immigrant feelings arose. People opposed to
immigration, called nativists, felt that immigration threatened the future of “native”
born citizens. Some nativists thought that immigrants took jobs away from “real”
Americans. Others thought they brought crime and disease.
E. The American Party was a group of nativists who joined together to form a new
political party in the 1850s. They formed secret anti-Catholic societies. The party
became known as the Know-Nothing Party, because they answered questions by
saying, “I know nothing.”
F. The Know-Nothing Party wanted stricter citizenship laws and wanted to ban foreignborn
citizens from holding office. In the mid-1850s, the movement split over slavery.
A Northern branch and a Southern branch formed. Slavery also divided the Northern
and Southern states.
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Chapter 13, Section 3
end
I. Rise of the Cotton Kingdom (Pages 397–399)
A. The economy of the South thrived by 1850 because of cotton. It became the leading cash
crop. Tobacco and rice had been profitable in colonial times, but tobacco depended on
foreign markets and the price fluctuated. Rice could not be grown in the dry inland areas.
In the Deep South—Georgia, South Carolina, Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri,
Arkansas, and Texas—cotton helped the economy prosper, and slavery grew stronger.
B. Eli Whitney’s cotton gin revolutionized cotton production. The machine removed seeds
from cotton fibers. Aworker could clean only 1 pound of cotton a day by hand, but with
the machine, a worker could clean 50 pounds. The cotton gin led to the need for more
workers. Southern planters relied on enslaved laborers to plant and pick the cotton.
C. The British textile industry created a huge demand for cotton and kept the price high.
The Deep South was committed to cotton, with some areas also growing rice and
sugarcane. The Upper South––Maryland, Virginia, and North Carolina––was also
agricultural and produced tobacco, hemp, wheat, and vegetables.
D. The value of enslaved people increased due to the reliance on them for producing
cotton and sugar. The Upper South became a center for the sale and transport of
enslaved people in the region.
II. Industry in the South (Pages 399–400)
A. The South remained rural and agricultural. The entire South produced fewer
manufactured goods than the state of Massachusetts in the 1850s.
B. Several barriers to industry developed in the South:
1. Because cotton was so profitable, farming was important, not new business.
2. Because capital, or money to invest in business, was lacking, new industry did
not develop. People saw no reason to sell their land or enslaved workers to raise
money for industry, and they believed their economy would continue to prosper.
3. Because the market for manufactured goods in the South was smaller than in the
North, this also discouraged industrial development.
4. Some Southerners did not want industry.
C. Some Southern leaders wanted to develop industry so that the South would not be
dependent on the North for manufactured goods. They also wanted the South to
develop their economy. These leaders were the exception, though, not the rule.
1. William Gregg opened a textile factory in South Carolina in 1844.
2. In Richmond, Virginia, Joseph Reid Anderson took over the Tredegar Iron Works
in the 1840s and made it a leading producer of iron in the nation.
D. Goods were transported via natural waterways. Most towns were along rivers or on
the coast. Roads were poor and there were few canals. Railroad lines were mostly
local and did not connect parts of a region. By 1860 only about one-third of the rail
lines were in the South.
Copyright © by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc
Chapter 13 Section 4
I. Small Farms and Plantations (Pages 401–402)
A. Most Southerners were small farmers without enslaved people or were planters with a
few enslaved laborers. Only a very few planters could afford the large plantations and
numerous enslaved people to work it. Southerners were of four types: yeomen, tenant
farmers, rural poor, and plantation owners.
B. Yeomen were farmers without enslaved people. They made up the largest group of
whites in the South. Most owned land and lived in the Upper South and hilly rural
areas of the Deep South. Their farms were from 50 to 200 acres. They grew crops for
themselves and to sell or trade.
C. Tenant farmers rented land or worked on landlords’ estates. The rural poor lived in
crude cabins in wooded areas, planted corn, and fished and hunted for food. They
were self-sufficient and refused any work that resembled enslaved labor.
II. Plantations (Pages 402–403)
A. Plantation owners wanted to earn profits, and they did this by selling cotton. Plantations
had fixed costs, such as feeding and housing workers and maintaining equipment. These
did not vary greatly. However, owners could not know how much their cotton would
bring in because prices varied from season to season and market to market.
B. Planters sold their cotton to agents from cotton exchanges in large cities such as
Charleston, New Orleans, Mobile, and Savannah. The agents held the cotton until
the price rose and then sold it. Planters did not get any money until the agents sold
the cotton, so they were always in debt. The agents did extend credit, or a loan, to the
planters for the time that they held the cotton.
C. Most plantations’ wealth was measured by possessions, including enslaved people.
Only about 12 percent of the South’s farms and plantations held more than half the
enslaved people. About half of the planters held fewer than five enslaved workers.
D. Plantation wives were responsible for the enslaved people and supervising the
plantation buildings and other gardens. They also kept the financial records. Life
was lonely, especially when planters traveled to make new deals with agents.
E. Plantation work involved many chores. Some enslaved African Americans worked in
the house, cleaning, cooking, sewing, and doing laundry. Other enslaved African
Americans were skilled workers, trained as carpenters, blacksmiths, shoemakers, or
weavers. Some worked in the pastures, but most were field hands, supervised by an
overseer, working from sunrise to sunset.
III. Life Under Slavery (Pages 403–406)
A. Life was full of hardships and misery. Enslaved African Americans worked long
hours, earned no money, and had little hope of freedom. Many were separated from
their families when sold to different plantation owners.
1. They had the bare necessities in their slave cabins. Each cabin was shared by
dozens of people living together in a single room.
2. Family life was uncertain. Law did not recognize marriages, but many enslaved
African Americans did marry. Families were separated when wives or children
were sold. The extended family provided some stability and was an important
aspect of the culture.
B. Although enduring many difficulties, they kept their African culture alive and mixed
it with American ways. Even though slavery was legal in the South, the slave trade
was outlawed in 1808. As no new enslaved Africans entered the United States, almost
all the enslaved people by 1860 were born here.
C. Many enslaved people accepted Christianity, and it became a religion of hope for them.
The spiritual, or African American religious folk song, provided a way to secretly communicate
with one another.
D. Slave codes made life more difficult. These were laws that controlled the enslaved
people, such as prohibiting them from gathering in large groups, leaving their master’s
property without a pass, and making it a crime to teach them how to read or write.
E. Resistance to slavery took the form of working slowly, pretending to be sick, or
sometimes setting fire or breaking tools. Armed rebellions were rare. Nat Turner, who
taught himself to read and write, led a group on a short violent rampage in
Southampton County, Virginia, in 1831. They killed at least 55 whites before being
captured. Turner was hanged. More severe slave codes were passed as a result.
F. Some enslaved people escaped slavery. Most who were successful escaped via the
Underground Railroad, which was a network of safe places to stop along the long
journey to the North in “safe houses” owned by whites and free African Americans.
Most runaways were captured and punished. Harriet Tubman and Frederick
Douglass, both born into slavery, fled north. They became African American heroes
for their efforts to help free more enslaved people.
IV. Life in the Cities (Pages 406-407)
A. By 1860 several large cities existed, such as Baltimore and New Orleans. Others were
on the rise such as Charleston, Richmond, and Memphis. Baltimore’s population was
212,000. New Orleans had 168,000 people. Population included whites, some enslaved
people, and free African Americans.
B. Free African Americans became barbers, carpenters, and traders. They founded
churches and institutions. In New Orleans they formed an opera company. Not all
prospered though, and many were not given an equal share in economic and political
life.
C. Between 1830 and 1860, Southern states passed laws that limited the rights of free
African Americans. Most states would not allow them to migrate from other states. In
1859 in Arkansas, they were ordered to leave the state.