1. Life at the Turn
of the 20th Century

2. Expansion of Education

3. Public School and Education Statistics
1870
50% of white children attended free public schools
Only 2% of all 17-year-olds graduated from high school
Few states had mandatory attendance laws
Rural students attended only from November to April
20% of the population was illiterate

4. Public School and Education Statistics
1900
31 states had passed laws requiring children between 8 – 14 years old to attend school
12% of Americans were illiterate
1910
72% of American children attended school
8.6% of 17-year-olds graduated from high school
8% of Americans were illiterate

5. Higher Education Expands
More than 150 new colleges opened
College enrollment more than doubled
1880’s-90’s Men’s colleges refused to admit female students, but sometimes established separate women’s colleges

6. Colleges for Women
Usually funded by private donors (philanthropists) who wished to give money to good causes.
1865 Vassar College (New York)
1879 Radcliffe College (MA)
1891 Barnard (New York)
1891 Pembroke (Rhode Island)

7. College & African Americans
1890 Only 160 black students were attending white colleges
1891 Only 30 black women in colleges
African American colleges with over 2000 graduates

8. Booker T. Washington 1856 – 1915 Born into slavery
Age 9 went to work in a salt furnace
Age 16 worked as a janitor to pay his way through the Hampton Normal and Agricultural Institute
Became a teacher
continued

9. 1
Booker T. Washington
1881 became head of the Tuskegee Institute in Alabama, a new black normal school (a school for training teachers)
Encouraged African Americans to focus on economic security and vocational skills – instead of political equality with whites
1901 wrote autobiography, Up From Slavery

10. Booker T. Washington

11. W.E.B. DuBois Born in Massachusetts Graduated from Fisk University2
W.E.B. DuBois
Born in Massachusetts
Graduated from Fisk University
1895 became first black man to earn a Ph.D. from Harvard
Taught at Atlanta University until 1910
Rejected Washington’s views
continued

12. 2
W.E.B. DuBois
Encouraged blacks to seek an advanced education instead of vocational training and to seek political and social equality with whites
1905 helped found the Niagara Movement
1910 Became publications director for NAACP

13. W.E.B. Du Bois

14. Entertainment

15. Live theatrical performances 3
Vaudeville
Live theatrical performances
Variety shows with magic, music, comedy, and special performers like ventriloquists

17. Motion pictures became popular after The Great Train Robbery in 1903.
Movies 4
Motion pictures became popular after The Great Train Robbery in 1903.
Nickelodeons—theaters that charged 5-cent admission—became immensely popular

18. Theater audience being entertained

19. CIRCUS Began traveling the country by railroad in 18725
CIRCUS
Began traveling the country by railroad in 1872
Live shows with acrobatics, animals and sideshows
Sometimes called the “Big Top”

20. The Big Top

21. 1936 Circus

22. Coney Island - the most famous from the era6
Amusement Parks
Rides like the steeplechase, Ferris wheel and roller coasters led to the growth of amusement parks
Coney Island - the most famous from the era

23. The
Steeplechase
Coney Island
1906

24. Ferris Wheel
Chicago
World’s Fair
1893

25. Coney Island
New York

26. Boxing, horseracing and baseball were the most popular.
Sports 7
Boxing, horseracing and baseball were the most popular.
In the late 1800s football began to grow in popularity also.

27. 8
Reading
As literacy increased, people began reading more for knowledge and entertainment
Newspapers Magazines Comics

28. Reporting of sensational news to sell papers9
Yellow Journalism
Reporting of sensational news to sell papers
Scandals
Vices
Murders
Foreign affairs

29. Racial Issues

30. Discrimination
Methods of keeping people of different races from obtaining political power or having equality 10

31. 11
Voting Restrictions
Methods of keeping African-Americans from exercising their right to vote

32. A tax charged before a person was allowed to vote 12
Poll Tax
A tax charged before a person was allowed to vote
Used to keep poor blacks from voting

33. This allowed poor illiterate whites to vote
Grandfather Clause
Exempted a person from the voting restrictions of poll taxes and literacy tests if their grandfather had voted
This allowed poor illiterate whites to vote 13

34. Prevented inter-racial marriages14
Jim Crow Laws
Southern laws that required segregation in all public establishments such as restaurants, theaters, parks
Prevented inter-racial marriages

35. 15
Plessy v. Ferguson
1896 Supreme Court case that said blacks and whites could be required to use separate facilities as long as they were equal
“Separate but equal” clause of the ruling made segregation legal nationwide
Blacks were denied civil rights for another 70 years

36. Usually refers to white violence against blacks by hanging or burning16
Lynching
The murdering of someone suspected or accused of a crime without a proper trial
Usually refers to white violence against blacks by hanging or burning

37. A group of African Americans that called for17
Niagara Movement
A group of African Americans that called for
Full civil liberties
An end to racial discrimination
The recognition of human brotherhood

38. NAACP 18 National Association for the Advancement of Colored People
Founded in 1909 to end discrimination, oppose racism and gain civil rights for African-Americans through the court system
Had black and white members
Still in existence today