1. Chapter 24
Industry Comes of Age

2. Growth of Railroads
35,000 miles of track in 1865 vs. 192,556 miles in 1900
US government subsidies
Land grants= $ for railroad companies
Railroads brought “civilization” to the West
1862= transcontinental railroad
Union Pacific Railroad= west from Omaha, Nebraska (Irish)

3. Federal Land Grants to Railroads The heavy red lines indicate areas within which the railroads might be given specific parcels of land. As shown in the inset, land was reserved in belts of various widths on either side of a railroad’s right of way. Until the railroad selected the individual mile-square sections it chose to possess, all such sections within the belt were withdrawn from eligibility for settlement.

4. Promoting the Union Pacific Railroad, 1869

5. Growth of Railroads
Central Pacific Railroad= east from Sacramento, California (Chinese)
“Big 4” financed
2 lines met at Ogden, Utah= western growth
4 other transcontinental RR by 1900
Northern Pacific Railroad
The Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe
The Southern Pacific
The Great Northern

6. The Union Pacific and the Central Pacific Link at Promontory Point, Utah, May 10, 1869 Railroad financiers, dignitaries, spectators, and Chinese (Central Pacific) and Irish (Union Pacific) work gangs witnessed the historic joining that created the nation’s first transcontinental railroad. After the two locomotives chugged within a few feet of each other, Central Pacific chief and former California governor Leland Stanford tapped a golden spike into a prepared hole on the last tie with a silver-plated maul.

7. Growth of Railroads
Cornelius Vanderbilt= replaced iron ties with steel
Standardized rails
Westinghouse air brake
Pullman Palace Cars
Linking US with RR= new markets and raw materials
New settlements along RR
Ecological problems
Time Zones established

8. Traveling First Class This sumptuously appointed Pullman Palace Car offered its prosperous passengers the comforts of home while they were far away from it.

9. Government Intervention
Common people devoted to free enterprise
Panic of the 1870’s= farmers began protesting RR corruption (The Grange)
Wabash case 1886
Interstate Commerce Act 1887
Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC)

10. Captains of Industry Andrew Carnegie (Carnegie Steel)
Vertical integration= cartel
John D. Rockefeller (Standard Oil)
Horizontal integration= monopoly
JP Morgan (JP Morgan and Company)- financier and banker

11. J. P. Morgan (1837–1913) As the most influential banker of his day, Morgan symbolized to many people the power and arrogance of “finance capitalism.” The chronic skin disorder on his nose inspired the taunt “Johnny Morgan’s nasal organ has a purple hue.”

12. Washington as Seen by the Trusts, 1900 “What a funny little government,” John D. Rockefeller observes in this satirical cartoon. His own wealth and power are presumed to dwarf the resources of the federal government.

13. Steel Industry “Steel is King!”= heavy industry
1870’s: Cornelius Vanderbilt and his NY Central RR
By 1890’s= US producing 1/3 of world’s steel
Bessemer Process
US had all the right ingredients for steel making

14. Steel Industry Andrew Carnegie in Pittsburgh
Eliminated middlemen
By 1900= ¼ of US’s steel ($25 million/year)
JP Morgan= deal to buy Carnegie Steel for $480 million
Created US Steel in 1901= 1st billion dollar company
Carnegie retired to philanthropy

15. Oil Industry 1859: first oil field kerosene
Internal combustion engine= oil revived
John D. Rockefeller and Standard Oil
Eliminate middlemen and competition
By 1877 controlled 95% of oil refineries
Forced rebates from railroads, spies in other companies
Other trusts formed- Captains of Industry or Robber Barons?

16. The Octopus, 1904 This cartoon visually captures a feeling of widespread resentment against Standard Oil as a powerful, sprawling “octopus” whose tentacles controlled all branches of government.

17. The Gospel of Wealth
Wealthy class saw wealth as helped by divine intervention
Andrew Carnegie and The Gospel of Wealth 1889
Most subscribed to Social Darwinism
Emerging Plutocracy class divide widening
Used Constitution to protect business

18. Sherman Anti-Trust Act
Federal government needed to step in to curb monopolies
1890 passed Sherman Anti-Trust Act
No combinations in restraint of trade
Failed to stop monopolies in early days- actually used against unions
Would be used in future successfully

19. Changing America Wealth and standard of living increasing
Immigrants- no longer a society for “yeomen farmers”
Women in “female friendly” jobs= economic and social opportunities
Delayed marriage and children, paid less
The Gibson Girl image
Class division= socialist/radical criticism
US= nation of wage earners- tied to economy more

20. Gibson Girl, 1899 Illustrator Charles Dana Gibson created a sensation with his drawings of healthy, athletic, young women. The image of the “Gibson Girl” inspired new standards of female fashion as the twentieth century opened, and came to symbolize women’s growing in dependence and assertiveness.

21. American Industry in 1900

22. Breaker Boys at South Pittson, Pennsylvania, 1911 Photographer Lewis Hine captured the grimness of these mine helpers’ lives. For hours they sat on benches above a moving belt, breathing coal dust deep into their lungs and kicking large pieces of coal with their feet, breaking the lumps to uniform size for shipment. Photographs like this one became icons of the reform crusade against child labor, a campaign that succeeded only with the passage of the Fair Labor Standards Act in 1938.

23. Labor Movement 1872: 32 national unions National Labor Union 1866
8 hour work day, arbitration
Hurt by the Panic of 1870’s
The Knights of Labor 1869 took over as leader in labor movement
Led by Terence V. Powerderly
Skilled and unskilled
Safety codes, arbitration, 8 hour work day

24. The Strike, by Robert Koehler, 1886 Scenes like this were becoming more typical of American life in the late nineteenth century as industrialism advanced spectacularly and sometimes ruthlessly. Here Koehler (1850–1917) shows an entire community of men, women, and children—many of them apparently immigrant newcomers—challenging the power of the “boss.” The scene is tense but orderly, though violence seems to be imminent as one striker reaches for a rock.

25. The Haymarket Riot
May Day strikes 1886 Chicago had socialists and anarchists
Police killed 4 strikers rally called for at Haymarket Square
Police about to advance on strikers when a bomb was thrown (May 4)- opened fire
Anarchists arrested- 5 sentenced to death, 3 to life in prison
1892 Governor John P. Altgeld
Haymarket Riot hurt Knights
Knights divided between skilled and unskilled- left for AFL

26. The American Federation of Labor
AFL 1886 led by Samuel Gompers= federation of unions
Wanted closed shop agreements
Skilled labor union (craft)- 50,000 by 1900 (only 3% of workers)
Faced problems between
23,000 strikes, 6,610,000 workers affected, $450 million lost
Some industries accepted unions, most still focused on destroying

27. Samuel Gompers (1850–1924) Gompers (second from the right in the first row), shown here marching in a labor demonstration in Washington, D.C., in 1919, once declared, “Show me the country in which there are no strikes and I’ll show you that country in which there is no liberty.”