1. Life in the Industrial Revolution

2. This age is often called the Victorian Time
After Queen Victoria of England.
Ruled 1837 – 1901
Queen when she was 18 and England was still mostly agrarian.
By the time she died, England was an industrial power and industrial barons ruled – not the blue bloods.

3. The Cause of the Industrial Revolution
“Surplus Population”
There was a population boom in the early 1800s.
More efficient agriculture meant more food, but less need for workers.
Extra workers turned to “cottage industries” like weaving.
That gave rise to the factories.

4. The Rise of the Industrial Revolution
The invention of the steam engine.
Powered equipment and transportation.
James Watt
Mining, chemicals, machine tools, textile manufacturing, and metalurgy all started because of the steam engine.

5. Social Effects? Money was now to be earned in industry – not by land.
Nobility and gentry became poor.
The rise of the industrial barons and the middle class.
Businessmen, bankers, industrialists.

6. The New Middle Class Supported the “PROTESTANT WORK ETHIC”
Hard work and thrift is what got you ahead.
Didn’t particularly value higher education unless it created money.
Little charity for those that didn’t succeed.

7. Life in the Factories 14 hour shifts
Children as young as 8 could work.
But younger than 9 were restricted to 10 hour work days.
Under 18 restricted to 12 hours a day.
NO safety precautions for workers either.

8. The Rise of Poverty with Urbanization
Huge shifts of population – skilled and unskilled to urban areas.
Housing was scarce and overcrowded.
More workers than jobs meant that wages were SUBSISTENCE.

9. Child Labor Children were expected to contribute to family income.
Young children had jobs like:
Chimney sweeps
Scrambling under machinery to pick up dropped parts.
Pulling coal through tunnels too tiny for adults.
Making and selling matches, blacking (shoe polish), flowers.

10. The Worship of Money
Almost everything was tolerated if it gained profit.
Profit was the sign of success and “God’s Grace” on your life.
CONSPICUOUS CONSUMPTION was encouraged!

11. If one couldn’t make money?
There was a moral fault with you.
The Poor House might “cure” you.
A prison for those who were in debt.
You lived in slave conditions until you were ransomed out by your family / friends or you might “work” your way out.
RARELY happened.
SLAVERY.

12. Charles Dickens and Social Reform in Victorian Times
Writing novels and in the magazines – serials – he encouraged people to think that they have a duty to help those less fortunate than themselves.

13. A Christmas Carol
Dickens loved to particularly attack three abuses he saw in his time:
Child abuse
Lack of power of children.
A bad education system
Bankers and industrialists

14. A Christmas Carol – A look at Victorian Morality
For most Victorians – they would’ve approved of Scrooge’s behavior.
But three ghosts put a mirror up to Scrooge and he finds he doesn’t measure up to people that were considered “less” than him.
His clerk, Bob Cratchett
His nephew, Fred