THE RISE OF INDUSTRIAL AMERICA

BUILDING RAILROADS

• Railroad building was so expensive that the government had to provide subsidies • Land grants were made along the proposed

routes

BUILDING A RAILROAD

• The deadlock over the Transcontinental Railroad ends when the south secedes• Union Pacific Railroad created by Congress• Started westward from Omaha, Nebraska• Used federal loans• Built by Irish “Paddies” (Union army vets)• Faced attack from the Indians

• Central Pacific Railroad• Started eastward from Sacramento, California• Four men served as private financial backers• Built by Chinese laborers

• Completed in 1869 at Promontory Point, Utah

COMPLETION OF THE TRANSCONTINENTAL RAILROAD

IMPACT OF THE RAILROAD ON AMERICAN LIFE

• Towns along the railroad boom, those who aren’t near die

• Created domestic market for raw materials and manufactured goods

• Created markets for new goods (ex. Steel)• Stimulating mining and agriculture (especially in the

West)• Contributed to the growth of cities• RR companies help stimulate immigration • Negative environmental impact• Creation of time zones• Created millionaires • Corruption

INTERSTATE COMMERCE ACT (1887)

• Prohibited rebates and pools and required the railroads to publish their rates openly• Forbade unfair discrimination against shippers• Outlawed charging more for a short haul than

for a long one• Set up Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC)

to administer and enforce the new legislation

IMPACT OF THE INTERSTATE COMMERCE ACT

• Fear of corruption in the ICC• Provided a forum for competing businesses to

work to resolve conflicts• Stabilized existing business system• First large scale act by the federal government to

regulate business in the best interest of society

POSTWAR INDUSTRIAL EXPANSION

• Led by the RR, the late 19th Century is a period of rapid industrial expansion• Possible because there is abundant liquid

capital (millionaires)• Use of natural resources: coal, oil, and iron• Massive immigration provided a labor force• Slow to come to the South• American ingenuity• Alexander Graham Bell – telephone• Thomas Edison – phonograph, electric

light bulb, motion pictures

IMPACT OF THE NEW INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION ON AMERICA

• Standard of living rises• Women began working in larger numbers• Class divisions accentuated • A nation of farmers became a nation of wage

earners• Pressures for foreign trade• Immigrants fill cities, creating a large unskilled

workforce

WORKING IN THE GILDED AGE

• Unskilled, repetitive manual labor • Factories run by impersonal corporations• Worked 12 hours a day, 6 days a week (to maximize

profits)• Piecework encouraged speed• work was performed in sweatshops• Division of labor – Unskilled, repetitive manual labor • Dangers:• machines were noisy• light and ventilation were poor• Fatigue• faulty equipment• careless training led to accidents and fires

• Child labor