UrbanizationUrbanizationThe Challenges Facing The Challenges Facing

American CitiesAmerican Cities

Americanization MovementAmericanization Movement

• Most immigrants who streamed into the US in the late 19th Century became city dwellers

• Why? -Cheap -Convenient -Jobs for Unskilled Labors (mills &

factories)

• The movement was designed to assimilate people from a wide range of cultures into the dominant culture

Problems With AssimilationProblems With Assimilation

• Immigrants did not want to abandon their traditions

• Cities hosted ethnic communities providing social support for new immigrants from the same countries

• Examples?-China Town(SF) -Japan Town(SF)-Brooklyn(NY) -Queens(NY)

Migration: Country to CityMigration: Country to City

• Improvements in farming technology was both good news and bad news for farmers

• Inventions?-McCormick Reaper -Steel Plow

• More efficient farming but fewer laborers needed

• Southern farmers lost their livelihoods to African Americans

Between 1890 and 1910 about 200,000 African Americans moved north and west to escape racial violence, economic hardship, and political oppression

Urban ProblemsUrban Problems

• Urban population skyrocketed, city governments faced problems of how to provide residents with needed services and safe living conditions

• There are six main problems every urban city in American found themselves facing

Housing TransportationWater SanitationCrime Fire (Earthquake SF)

HousingHousing

• Two housing options at the start of the industrial revolution

Buy a House on the outskirts of town Rent cramped room in one of the many

boarding houses in the center of the city• But as the population increased, the housing

options planed to house single families now housed two & three at a time

• This housing situation is known as tenements

TransportationTransportation

• Mass transit was designed to move large numbers of people on fixed routes

• Examples? -Street Car(SF) -Electric Subway(Boston)

• Urban areas now were linked with city neighborhoods

Water

• Cities failed to supply safe drinking water• Cities like NY and Cleveland built public

waterworks to handle the increased demand • Homes did not have indoor plumbing• Residents had to collect water in pails from

faucets on the street and heat for bathing• Unsafe water lead to diseases like cholera and

typhoid fever

SanitationSanitation

• Horse manure piled on the streets• Sewage flowed through open gutters• Factories spewed foul smoke into the

air• No dependable trash collection• People dumped their garbage into

the streets

CrimeCrime

• As city population increased, pickpockets and thieves flourished

• New York organized a full time police force in 1844

• No other city in America had the means to handle the crime

Fire (Earthquake SF) Fire (Earthquake SF)

• Major fires occurred in almost every large city in America largely due to the lack to reliable water

• City buildings had been built out of wood • Buildings we close together • Candles and Kerosene heater were used for

lighting and heating and posed as a fire hazard• Firefighters for the most part were volunteers

and were not always available then they were needed

• 1853 Cincinnati established the first paid fire department