MAIN IDEA

• A growing transportation network spread people, products, and information across the nation

• Important vocabulary terms to know:– Consolidation, standard

gauge, rebate, pool

Railroad ExpansionThe first transcontinental railroad, completed in 1869, was soon followed by others.

By 1890s- Five Railway lines crossed the country, 100s branched off from them.

Railroad Expansion

0

50,000

100,000

150,000

200,000

250,000

1860 1900

Miles ofrailroadtracks inthe U.S.

CONSOLIDATIONThe practice of combining separate companies in an industry.

Railroad Barons

• They were aggressive and competitive

• Some of their actions were questionable, but the government was not active in regulating or controlling the rules of business back then

Cornelius Vanderbilt

James J. Hill

Railroad Barons

Powerful individuals that controlled the nation’s rail traffic.

Railroads Stimulate the Economy1. Around 1880, RR started using tracks of steel- Stimulated America’s steel industry.

2. The lumber industry, which supplied the wood for railway ties, saw extraordinary growth.

3. Coal industry-

which fueled

locomotives

grew as well.

Railroads Stimulate the Economy• Railroads helped the economy

grow by:4. Carrying raw materials to factories

(coal, iron ore, timber, etc.)

5. Provided work for thousands of people (RR’s employed more workers than any other industry in the late 1800’s)

Improving the Railroads

4 feet, 8 ½ inches for the width of the RR track.

4’8 1/2”

Railroad Technology

• Railway transportation improved with new inventions

• Four developments were especially important:

4 Railway Developments

1. Air brakes

• Developed by George Westinghouse

• Made train travel safer by improving the trains ability to stop

4 Railway Developments

2. Janney Car couplers

* Invented by Eli H. Janney

* Made it easier to link cars together

4 Railway Developments3. Refrigerated Cars• Invented by Gustavus Swift• Made it possible to ship meat and

other goods without them spoiling

4 Railway Developments

4. Pullman Sleeping Car

*Invented by George M. Pullman

*A luxury railcar with seats and beds for overnight journeys

Competing for Customers

Give discounts to biggest customers.

RRs divided railway businesses into regions. Each company controlled a different region.

Smaller RR companies couldn’t compete and were forced out of business.

Giving discounts for big customers raised freight costs for farmers and other customers who shipped small amounts of goods.

With no other competition in its region, a RR could charge higher prices.

Railroads Change America1. The growing railroad network paved the

way for American industry to expand into the West.

2. As farmers settled the Great Plains, the manufacturing center for agricultural equipment moved from central New York State to Illinois and Wisconsin.

3. Trains redistributed the population. They carried homesteaders into the Great Plains and the West.

4. Trains made it easy for people to move from rural areas to the cities.

Time ZonesRailroads affected the way Americans thought about time. As train travel became more common, people began measuring distances by how many hours the trip took rather than the number of miles traveled.The spread of the RR system led to a

national system of time with four time zones.

How many continental U.S. time zones are there?

Based on the map, what time is it in Texas when it is 4:00 p.m. in Alaska?

Samuel Morse introduced the telegraph in 1844. Significance: instant communication

Before this invention, people had to deliver messages by horse, walking over, etc.

Telegraph Key

Transmitter

By 1860 – 1,000s of miles of telegraph lines.

Dit . Dah -

1866 – He managed to lay a telegraph cable across the Atlantic Ocean.This new TRANSATLANTIC telegraph – carried messages across the ocean in a matter of seconds. Significance: It brought the United States and Europe closer together.

Cyrus Field

1876 –Significance: Invented a device that would transmit speech!

While preparing to test it, he accidentally spilled battery acid on his clothing and called to his assistant:

“Mr. Watson, come here. I want you!”

He heard it through the telephone! SUCCESS!

The telephone was first sold to businesses. Before long, it was common in many homes!

John Thurman’s Vacuum Cleaner • Significance:

It simplified housework

George Eastman’s Kodak Camera

• Significance: easier and less costly to take pictures

Thomas Alva Edison

First invention- (while he was a telegraph operator) was a gadget that sent automatic telegraph signals. (So he could sleep on the job.)

Went into the invention business while still in his 20s.

Set up business in Menlo Park, New Jersey.

Edison’s inventions included:

phonograph: Significance: recording sound

the motion picture projector: Movies on screen

the telephone transmitter: Communication

First Motion Picture Projector

Phonograph

Edison designed power plants that could produce electric power. In 1840, he lit up Menlo Park with 40 bulbs. He had the 1st Central Electric Power Plant in 1882 in New York City- that lit up 85 buildings!

Light Bulb

Took Edison’s work with electricity even further.

He developed transformers- that would send electric power cheaply- over long distances.

Soon electricity powered:

Factories, trollies,

Streetlights and lamps

all over America!

He invented the SHOE MAKING MACHINE – which performed many steps previously done by hand. It made shoe making easier.

Revolutionized the shoe industry!

African-American Inventor

“We’re going to get a car now that we can make in great volume and get the prices way down.”

Charles Storenson, Ford’s General Superintendent described the sturdy black vehicle as:

“ . . . A car which anyone could afford to buy, which anyone could drive anywhere, and which almost anyone could keep in repair.”

Henry Ford pioneered a new, less expensive way to manufacture cars.

Each worker performed an assigned task- again and again- at a certain stage in the production of the automobile.

Made Mass Production possible.

Decreased manufacturing costs.

Enabled company to sell products more cheaply.

Seeped from the ground

Was sold as medicine

In 1850, it was learned that petroleum could be burned to produce heat and smoke-free light and used to lubricate machinery.

Believed you could get petroleum by digging a well.

(Many thought he was crazy.)

He drilled a well in Titusville, Pennsylvania and struck oil!

Led to the creation of a multimillion dollar petroleum industry!

Railroads were the first businesses to form corporations – or incorporate. Soon manufacturing firms and other businesses incorporated as well.

Banks played a major role in this period of growth. Businesses borrowed money to expand their operations.

Banks made profits on the loans.

Oil industry grew rapidly in the late 1800s. Edwin Drake’s Titusville well produced 15 barrels of petroleum a day. “OIL RUSH” CITIES SPRANG UP.

Made his fortune from oil. He and 4 partners set up an oil refinery (to process oil) in Cleveland, Ohio.

Set up Standard Oil Company and set out to dominate the oil industry.

Rockefeller used this method to build his empire.

Combining competing firms into one corporation.

A company that sells shares of the business to the public.

Purchased shares in a business

People who invest in the corporation by buying STOCK- They are partial OWNERS.

Payments made to shareholders from the corporations profits.

To strengthen the corporation’s position in the oil industry, Rockefeller:

1. lowered his prices to drive his competitors out of business.

2.Pressured customers not to deal with rival oil companies

3.Pressured railroads to grant him rebates in exchange for his new business

A group of companies managed by the same board of directors

ALMOST TOTAL CONTROL BY A SINGLE PRODUCER

Two methods of making steel changed the Steel Industry:

The BESSEMER Process

and

The OPEN-HEARTH Process

Steel could be produced at affordable prices & in large quantities.

Dominated the steel industry by 1890. Companies became powerful through Vertical Integration.

Acquiring all the companies that provided the equipment and services needed in all steps of production of a product

To gain control of all parts of the business of making and selling steel.

Used money to benefit the community.

Like John d. Rockefeller and other industrial millionaires.

Carnegie donated $350 million to various organizations. He built Carnegie Hall in New York- a famous concert Hall, The Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, and more than 2,000 libraries worldwide!

States passed laws that made easier.

Mergers concentrated economic power in a few giant corporations and a few powerful individuals, such as Rockefeller and banker J. Piermont Morgan.

By 1900 1/3 of all American manufacturing was controlled by just 1% of the country’s corporations.

Driving force behind the great economic growth of the period. Also, source of problems for consumers.

Response to growing opposition to trusts and monopolies.

This law passed by Congress sought “to protect trade and commerce against unlawful restraint and monopoly.”

How does vertical integration differ from horizontal integration?

Vertical integration combines companies at all levels of manufacturing into one corporation, while horizontal integration combines competing firms into one corporation.

On a spring day in 1886, about 12,000 workers in Chicago’s Haymarket Square manufacturing district were on strike. Nearly all were immigrants, and many wore small red ribbons on their jackets. At 2 o’clock a man climbed up on an empty freight car near the crowd. He moved to the edge of the roof and waved frantically at the crowd below:

“Stand firm. Let every man stand shoulder to shoulder and we will win this fight. We must have our rights. Strike while the iron is hot . . .”

As mass production spread, factories became larger and less personal for industrial workers:

*10-12 hour workdays *Can be fired at any time, for any reason *Many lost jobs at business downturns, or replaced by cheaper immigrant labor

SWEATSHOPS

A shop or factory where workers work long hours at low pay, under unhealthy conditions

Child Labor Laws

In 1900, in factories. Many states passed laws stating that children had to be at least 12 years old and couldn’t work more than 10 hours a day. Many employers ignored the child-labor laws and they didn’t apply to agriculture (which employed about 1 million children.)

Women Workers

By 1900, more than 1 million women were in industry. No laws regulated salaries, so women got paid about ½ what men earned for the same work.

Dissatisfied workers organized into groups called Labor Unions.

DEMAND

Better Pay Better Working Conditions

Trade unions represented workers in certain crafts or trades, such as carpentry- Had little influence because they represented only 1 trade.

Shorter Hours

Labor Unions

Samuel Gompers

Led AFL (American Federation of Labor) representing skilled workers of various crafts. FORMED BY A GROUP OF NATIONAL TRADE UNIONS.

Wanted: COLLECTIVE BARGAINING- RIGHT FOR UNION REPRESENTATIVES TO BARGAIN WITH MANAGEMENT

1911, a fire broke out at the Triangle Shirtwaist Company factory, a crowded sweatshop. Workers, mostly young, immigrant women couldn’t escape because employers locked the doors to keep them from leaving early. Nearly 150 died.

Mary Harris Jones – Mother Jones

Spent 50 years fighting for women’s rights.

The disaster lead the International Ladies’ Garment Workers Union (ILGWU) to push for a safer working environment.

Economic depression of 1870s and 1890s, led companies to fire workers and lower wages. Unions responded with large strikes that sometimes sparked violence.

.

Haymarket Riot

1886- During a protest a bomb is thrown and a police officer killed.

Homestead Strike

1892- 300 armed guards sent to protect nonunion workers at Carnegie’s Steel plant. Fighting left 10 dead.

Chapter 19 Test

FRIDAY!!!!!!