Key Terms (page 490-501)
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12-22-10
Rapid Urban Growth: in 1920 the Census revealed that the majority of the American
people now lived in “urban” areas meaning communities of 2500 or more. From 1860 to
1900 New York’s population had grown from 1 million to 3 million
African-American Communities: By the end of the 1800s there were over thirty cities with
populations of over 10000 African Americans, although they were mostly located in the
south there were some that bordered the major cities in the North like New York, Chicago,
Washington, and Baltimore
Diverse American City: During the heavy periods of immigration most of the migrations
were coming from Italy and Spain, however there was no national group that dominated.
Within the last four decades of the 1800s there were groups of immigrants beginning to
come from Italy, Germany, Scandinavia, Austria, Hungary, Russia, Great Britain, Ireland,
Poland, Greece, Canada, Japan, China, Holland, and Mexico creating a lot of ethnic
diversity where there were sometimes up to a dozen different ethnic groups in a city
Benefits of Ethnic Communities: Although there were so many different types of ethnic
groups in America it was easy for immigrants to find things they were familiar with for
example newspapers in their native language, stores selling their native foods, and
churches/synagogues
Americanization: Many people had immigrated to America with the idea of the New World
and had tried to break off their native cultural traditions to become more Americanized
and assimilate to be what many people thought of as the real American culture
Changing Gender Roles: Immigrants all had different traditions for females where they
were sometimes even more involved with domestic work than usual or would have their
lives planned and controlled until they were married. However due to the economic needs
women had began working outside of the home where they developed friendships, and
interests outside of the family
Nativism: Many first born Americans in the east had characterized the immigrants as the
“scum and offal of Europe” and that they were the source of all disorder to and corruption
of the urban world which was similar to the treatment towards Mexican, Chinese and
Japanese immigrants in the West
Immigration Restriction League: An organization similar to the American Protective
Association started in Boston by 5 Harvard alumni in an attempt to promote literacy tests
and other standards to screen immigrants which would help separate the desirable to the
undesirable
Advantages of Cheap Labor: Immigration provided a steady flow of cheap laborers which
many people argued that the industrial development would be impossible without
therefore President Grover Cleveland vetoed it in 1897
Frederick Law Olmstead and Calvert Vaux: landscape designers who became partners in
the 1850s to design New York’s Central Park. With a growth in the amount of parks being
built it also brought the spread of buildings like libraries, museum and opera and concert
halls
“City Beautiful” Movement: urban leaders attempted to transform the appearance of the
older neighborhood streets into grand avenues lined with impressive buildings
The Back Bay: a once marshy tidal area was turned into a neighborhood that took more
than forty years to complete
Growth of Suburbs: The “moderately well to do” and sometimes even the wealthy upper
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class took advantage of the low prices of land on the outer edges of the cities and settled
in these suburbs which led to creating more linked railroads leading into downtowns and
improved roads for street cars
Tenements: This used to describe buildings that were multiple family homes that were
rented out but by the late nineteenth century it was used to describe “slum dwellings.” It
was a place designed to give the laboring people a cheap shelter
Transportation Problems: In the last decades of the century there were many street that
were being fixed into paved streets with wooden blocks, bricks, or asphalt from the
original sea of mud/cloud of dust (weather dependent) however that was only about 60 of
the 2000 miles of streets
Mass Transit: In 1870 New York started the first elevated railway with noisy steam
powered trains that moved quickly on iron structures. In New York, Chicago, San Francisco
and some other cities cable cars towed with continuous underground cables were
experimented with. Then in 1888 the first electric trolley began running in Richmond,
Virginia which influenced over 850 towns to begin enhancing more ways of better and
quicker transportation by 1895. In 1897 the first American subway opened in Boston
where some of the trolley lines had been put underground. In the 1880s there were also
many bridges and roads being built, one of which is the dramatic steel-cable suspension
bridge known as the Brooklyn Bridge in New York City designed by John A. Roebling