Chapter 14
Forging the National Economy
1790-1860
By: Zak Boston
Tucker Corbett
Kaelan Donadio
Peter Donato
Ryan Kauer
John Tower
Julia Waldman
Austin Willoughby
Setting The Scene...
• The American population beginning to push west for cheap land
and for opportunity's in business and trade.
• The push was aided by newly invented machinery for farming and
manufacturing.
The Westward Movement
• The election of Andrew Jackson (First president from beyond
the Appalachians) brought attention to the wealth of the Western
Frontier.
• By 1840 the Demographic Center of the country was beyond the
Appalachians.
• Life on the frontier was pitiful. People were diseased, malnourished,
and often lacked shelter.
• Men were often isolated, uninformed, and superstitious.
• Literature of the era was often focused on the "lone wolf" individual.
Shaping The Western Landscape
• Many farmers would plant tobacco, exhaust the fields, and then
move on.
• Later settlers discovered the remaining crops could be burnt and
bluegrass would thrive on the charred fields, making them perfect
pastures.
• The sea-otter, bison and beaver fur trade thrived until both animals
nearly went extinct.
• Many admired America's pristine wilderness, which could not be
matched by any of Europe's nations.
• The natural beauty of the West led to much literature and art as well
as a conservation movement
• George Catlin - Painter & Student of Native American Life, proposed
the National Park System.
The March of the Millions
• Movement West caused a population boom. It was doubling
about every 25 years.
• By 1860 there were 33 states with 43 cities with more then
20,000 inhabitants.
• At the time, the US had the fourth largest population of the
Western World.
• This population boom brought around increased poverty,
reduced health, and higher crime rate.
• The need to remedy these led to Boston implementing the
first sewer system in 1823 and New York introducing pipe
supplied water in 1842.
• Immigration began to boom in the 1840's, adding hundreds
of thousands of people to the population each year.
The Emerald Isle Moves West
• Potato famine caused Ireland to lose about 2 million people.
Those that survived were poor, and flocked to America for
work.
• Many were too poor to afford land, and flocked to cities such
as Boston and most importantly New York.
• They received poor treatment and found it hard to find a
job accept in the dangerous Canal dredging, and railroad
businesses.
• Many Irish children were denied education, as parents had to
save money for property.
• Politics began to interest the Irish, and soon the Police force
was made up mostly of Irishmen.
• Many American Politicians gained offices at the time by openly
slandering the British, who the Irish population resented.
The German Forty-Eighters
• Between 1830 and 1860, many Germans came to
America because of crop failures and other
hardships.
• Unlike the Irish, the Germans possessed a modest
amount of material goods.
• Most of the Germans pushed west toward Wisconsin.
• Germans contributed to American culture. (ex.
Christmas Tree, Conestoga wagon, Kentucky rifle)
• Germans were better educated than Americans and
were opposed to slavery during the Civil War.
Flare-ups of Antiforiegnism
• In the 1840's and 1850's American "Nativists" feared they would
be outbred, outvoted, and overwhelmed by immigrant "rabble"
• The Roman Catholics created an entirely separate Catholic
educational system to avoid the American Protestant educational
system.
• Massive influx of Roman-Catholic immigrants in the 1840-50s,
Protestants were worried about this.
• The Order of the Star Spangle Banner, or the "know nothing"
party, fought for laws against immigration and naturalization
• Burning of Two churches - 13 citizens killed in Philadelphia in
1844.
Creeping Mechanization
• In 1750, British inventors made machines run on steam for the mass
production of textiles.
• This evolved into the Industrial Revolution, spreading to the U.S.
• The Industrial Revolution spread slowly to the U.S., because of the
widespread and successful farming, as it was cheap and well-fitted to
the landscape of the country.
• Labor was first scarce, then immigrants began to make their way to
the U.S. in the 1840s, getting jobs in factories.
• American factories had trouble competing with the British factories,
that created very cheap, massed produced goods.
• At this time, however, the farms still surpassed the output of the
factories in America
Whitney Ends the Fiber Famine
• Samuel Slatter was proclaimed "The Father of the factory
System" after memorizing british textile machine designs,
escaping to American and with the help of Moses Brown
establishing the first American textile machine in 1791
• Eli Whitney - First cotton gin in 1793
• The South's economy and hold on slavery was revamped
with the exponential growth of the cotton industry
• Factories first appeared in New England but soon became
a focal point of the entire northern economy
• By 1860 over 400 million pounds of southern cotton fed
over a northern mills, the American economy was
booming
Marvels in Manufacturing
• After the War of 1812 American factories became more popular and
America became opposed to British imports.
• The American manufacturing boom ended with the peace of Ghent
in 1815 - Went back to importing British goods at very low prices.
• Congress passed the Tariff of 1816 to control the shape of the
economy.
• 1798 Eli Whitney - mass production of muskets for U.S. Army.
Whitney helped factories to flourish in the North.
• 1846 Elias Howe - Invented sewing machine. Big step for clothing
industry.
• Boston Associates - dominated textile, railroad, insurance and
banking business of Mass.
• Laws of "free incorporation" - First passed in NY in 1848. Meant
that businessmen could create corporations w/o applying for
individual charters from legislature.
Workers and "Wage Slaves"
• Factory workers had long hours and low wages, and worked in
crude, unhealthy environments.
• In 1820, many of the factory workers were children under the age of
ten, victim to beatings and starvation from their bosses.
• In the 1820s and 1830s, during the presidency of Andrew Jackson,
the working class gained fought for rights, such as the right to vote,
tolerable working conditions, higher wages, and the 10-hour day.
• Employers were against the 10-hour day, but in 1840, President Van
Buren established this right to the workingpeople.
• Many workers went on strike during this time, arguing their rights
through the refusal to work.
• In the case Commonwealth v. Hunt the Supreme Court of
Massachusetts declared that labor unions were not illegal
conspiracies, but their actions had to be "honorable and peaceful"
Women and the Economy
• Women on the farm had important role in preindustrial economy - Spinning yarn, weaving cloth,
making soaps, candles, butter and cheese.
• "Factory girls" typically worked 6 days a week.
• Women were forbidden to form unions.
• Catharine Beecher urged women to enter into
teaching professions.
• Vast majority of working women were single.
• During the Industrial Revolution families were small
and child centered.
Western Farmers Reap A Revolution In
The Fields
• Pioneer families clear out forests as to plant corn because
of its versatility. Corn could be fed to hogs, (corn on the
hoof) or distilled into liquor (corn in the bottle)
• Being easy to transport, it became an early Western
farmer's staple market crop.
• John Derre of Illonois creates a plow strong enough to
break through the thickly matted western soil (1837)
• Cyrus McCormick creates a mechanical mower-reaper in
the 1830's.
• One man could do the work of five because it cut fields
widely, but with high precision.
• This leads to farmers buying more land and equipment,
seeing as they can do more work and harvest larger
amounts of crops.
Highways and Steamboats
• During the 1790's a private company completed the
Lancaster Turnpike in Pennsylvania. It was a 62 mile
highway from Philadelphia to Lancaster.
• In 1811 the Federal Government granted additions to the
National or Cumberland Road. Making the road stretch from
western Maryland to Vandalia, Illinois. A total of 591 miles.
• Robert Fulton installed a powerful steamboat in a small
vessel which became know as the Clermont. In 1807 the boat
made the 150 mile trip up the Hudson from New York to
Albany in a historic 32 hours
• By 1820 60 steamboats roamed the Mississippi, by 1860
over a thousand.
"Clinton's Big Ditch" in New York
• Governor DeWitt Clinton approved the Erie Canal,
construction began in 1817 by the end in 1825 the canal
measured 363 miles. The project became known as "The
Governors Gutter".
• The cost of shipping a ton of grain from Buffalo to New York
City droped from $100 to $5 and time from 20 days to 6.
• Farming and logging became more profitable while land
values increased all due to the easy of travel throughout the
great lakes.
The Iron Horse
• The first railroad appeared in the United States in 1828
• 32 years later in 1860 over thirty thousand miles of railroad
track had been constructed.
• Originally brakes were a problem, they were weak causing
the engineer to possibly miss the station once or twice before
being able to successfully stop.
• In 1833 the New York Legislature prohibited railroads from
carrying freight in fear it could cause problems for the canal
investors.
• Better brakes were introduced in 1859 making the railroads
safer and more appealing to the public.
Cables, Clippers, and Pony Riders
• 1858 a communication cable was stretched under the deep
Atlantic waters from Newfoundland to Ireland
• 1840's- 50's new ships were built: they were long, narrow,
and majestic, they were faster but could carry less cargo
• these "clipper ships" soon faded away after steam
boats proved to be useful
• 1860- Pony Express created to speedily carry mail from St.
Joseph, Missouri, to Sacramento, California
• After 18 months the Pony Express collapsed due to a lack of
profit
The Transport Web Binds the Union
• the desire of the east to move westward spurred the
transportation revolution
• canals and railroad tracks radiated out from the east, across
the the Alleghenies and into the heartland
• New York city became a gigantic port
• Each region specialized in a particular type of economic
activity:
• South raised cotton for New England and Britain
• West grew grain and livestock to feed factory workers in the
East and in Europe
• East made machines and textiles for the South and West
The Market Revolution
• transformed a subsistence economy of scattered farms and
tiny workshops into a national network of industry and
commerce
• Families that once raised all their own food and necessities,
now scattered to work for wages in mills, planting very few
of their own crops and more frequently using money to buy
goods made by strangers
• the home was once the center of economic production, now
it was a place of refuge from work
• advances in manufacturing and transportation brought
increased prosperity to all Americans
• this widened the gap between the rich and poor