The Growth of Cities and American Culture (1865-1900)

1
The Growth of Cities and American
Culture (1865-1900)

• (Chapter 18)

2
A Nation of Immigrants

• Population increase from 2.3 million in 1850?76.2
  million in 1900 16.2 million of this
  immigrants
• Push Factors A) poverty of displaced farmers
  driven from jobs by the mechanization of farm
  work B) overcrowding/unemployment b/c European
  population boom C) religious persecution (i.e.
  Jews in Russia)
• Pull Factors economic opportunities, US
  reputation for political and religious freedom,
  abundance of industrial jobs in cities large
  steamships? inexpensive one way passage in ships
  steerage allowed millions of poor Europeans to
  emigrate

3
Old Immigrants New Immigrants

• Throughout 1800s mainly northern and western
  Europe The British Isles, Germany, Scandinavia
• Mainly Protestants, w/minority Irish and German
  Catholics
• High level of literacy
• Blended easily into rural Amer. society

• 1890s- post WWI mainly southern and eastern
  Europeans (Italians, Greeks, Slovaks, Croats,
  Poles, Russians)
• illiterate poor peasants who fled autocratic
  countries
• Unaccustomed to democratic practices
• Largely Roman catholic, Greek Orthodox Jewish
• Crowded cities and poor ethnic neighborhoods in
  NY, Chicago other major US cities
• Around 25 birds of passage

4
Restricting Immigration

• By 1886, Congress passes new laws restricting
  immigration.
• Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 ban on all
  immigrants from China.
• Restrictions on undesirable persons (criminals,
  mentally ill)
• 1885- law prohibited contract labor in order to
  protect American workers
• immigration center in 1892 in Ellis Island new
  arrivals had to pass more rigorous medical
  documental examination, pay entry before entering

5
Supporters of Restriction

• Restriction supported by
• (A) labor unions
• (B) nativist society called the American
  Protective Association- openly prejudice
  against Catholics
• (C) Social Darwinists-believed immigrants
  inferior to English and German natives
• H/w despite restrictions, nearly 15 of US pop.
  was immigrants at turn of the century, until the
  1920s Quota Acts which almost closed Statue of
  Liberty.

6
Urbanization

• Cities provided central supply of labor for
  factories, principal market for goods
• shift of population from rural to urban. By
  1900, 40 of Amer. lived in towns or cities, by
  1920 more Amer. lived in urban communities than
  rural areas
• In late 19th century millions decided to seek
  new economic opportunities in the city, both
  immigrants and native born people left farms
  seeking industrial and commercial jobs
• Between 1897-1930, nearly 1 million southern
  blacks settle in northern and western cities

7
Changes in the Nature of Cities

• Horse drawn cars and cable cars replaced by
  electric trolleys, elevated railroads, subways
  transporting people farther from the citys
  commercial center. Building of Brooklyn Bridge,
  allows longer commutes btwn residential
  neighborhoods and the center city
• Mass transportation allowed for segregation based
  on income. Upper and middle classes move to
  suburbs to escape poverty and crime of the city
• skyscrapers emerge becoming a dominant feature
  in American urban skylines

8
Ethnic neighborhoods vs. Residential Suburbia

• Affluent citizens left residences near business
  districts, while poor moved in them
• Landlords create tenement apartments which could
  cram about 4,000 in one city block overcrowding
  led to filth, disease.
• In crowded tenements different immigrants could
  maintain their own language, culture, church or
  temple and social club.

• Upper and middle class Amer. decided to move out
  the city. Factors prompting movement (1)abundant
  land w/low cost (2) inexpensive transportation by
  rail (3)low cost construction methods (4) ethnic
  and racial prejudice (5)desire for grass,
  privacy, individual houses
• Late 1850s Frederick Law Olmsted designed a
  suburban community
• By 1900, suburbia became American ideal living

9
Boss and Machine Politics

• political parties which came under control of
  tightly organized groups of politicians, (known
  as political machines)
• Each machine had its top politician who gave
  orders and gave out govt jobs for loyal
  supporters
• Tammany Hall (NYC) started as social club, later
  power centers to coordinate needs of business,
  immigrants underprivileged in exchange for
  votes
• Party bosses knew how to manage social, ethnic
  and economic groups in the city. Political
  machines brought modern services to the city,
  like a rugged form of welfare.
• Political Machine sometimes helpful, sometimes
  corrupt like Boss Tweed in the 1860s pocketed
  almost 65 percent of public funds from NYC

10
Awakening of Reform

• New social consciousness in 1880s and 1890s
• Literature of Social criticism
• Henry George, Progress and Poverty- criticized
  laissez-faire economics, proposed placing a
  single tax on land to solve poverty and shed
  light on the inequalities in wealth caused by
  industrialization.
• Edward Bellamy, Looking Backward- book which
  envisioned a future era in which cooperative
  society had eliminated poverty, greed and crime
  helped shift the public opinion to support
  greater govt regulation.
• Settlement houses emerge, most famous being Hull
  House in Chicago (1889) Jane Addams by 1910,
  over 400 settlement houses in Americas largest
  cities. Settlement workers set precedent for
  future social workers, they were also activists
  for child-labor laws, housing reform and womens
  rights.
• Frances Perkins and Harry Hopkins will have
  leadership roles in FDRs reform program, the New
  Deal in the 1930s

11
Religion and Society

• Social Gospel movement- In 1880s and 1890s
  Protestant clergymen apply Christian principles
  to social problems, led by Walter Rauschenbusch
  who worked in NYCs Hells Kitchen urged
  organized religions to take up the cause of
  social justice.
• Dwight Moody and his Moody Bible Institute help
  urban evangelists adapt traditional Christianity
  to city life
• Salvation Army-(1879) imported from England in
  1879, provided the basic necessities of life for
  the homeless and the poor, while preaching the
  Christian gospel.
• Mary Baker Eddy- taught good health was the
  result of correct thinking about Father Mother
  God, founder of the Church of Christ Scientist-
  popularly known as Christian Science

12
Families and Women in Urban Society

• Urban life meant isolation from extended family
  for the most part, divorce rates increase to one
  in 12 marriages by 1900.
• Reduction in family size w/shift from rural to
  urban living children now seen more as an
  economic liability than a need for labor like on
  farms
• National average for birthrate and family size
  continued to drop
• Womens cause for suffrage launched at Seneca
  falls in 1848 carried by Elizabeth Cady Stanton
  and Susan B. Anthony. They helped found the
  National American Womens Suffrage Association.
  Wyoming was the 1st state to grant full suffrage
  to women in 1869. By 1900, some states allowed
  women to vote in local elections, most women
  allowed to control and own property after
  marriage already

13
Temperance and Morality

• Concern from urban reformers, especially women
• Womens Christian temperance union (WCTU) formed
  in 1874, under leadership of Frances E. Willard
  of Illinois had 500,000 members by 1898,
• Antisaloon League founded in 1893 became powerful
  political force and by 1916 persuaded 21 states
  to close down all saloons and bars.
• Carry A. Nation raids saloons and creates a
  sensation
• Moralists, thought cities to be breeding grounds
  for vice, obscenity, prostitution. Anthony
  Comstock of NY formed Society of Vice and
  persuaded Congress in 1873 to pass Comstock
  Law, which prohibited the mailing of obscene and
  lewd material/photos

14
Intellectual and Cultural Movements

• Changes in education, arts, sports
• Public Schools children now sent to
  kindergarten, elementary schools after 1865 began
  to teach the 3 Rs (reading, writing, arithmetic)
  with the increase in enrolled children in public
  schools, the literacy rate rose to 90 of the
  population in 1900
• Very significant was the tax-supported public
  high schools.
• Higher Education increase in US colleges in late
  1800s, largely result of (1)land grant colleges
  established under Morrill Acts of 1862 and 1890
  (2) universities founded by wealthy
  philanthropists (3) founding of new colleges for
  women (i.e.Smith, Bryn Mawr, Mount Holyoke)
• By 1900, 71 of colleges admitted women who were
  1/3 of attending students
• Changes in curriculm, introduction of electives
  allowing the US to produce its first generation
  of scholars who could compete w/Europeans.

15
Social Sciences and the professions

• New social sciences emerge including behavioral
  psychology, sociology, anthropology and political
  science.
• Study of human behavior
• Oliver Wendell teaches law should evolve with
  legal precedents
• Clarence Darrow argued that criminal behavior
  could be linked with environmental factors
• W.E.B. Du Bois was first African American to
  receive a doctorate from Harvard, advocated his
  talented tenth plan
• New trends in education and professions of 1900
  would have significant impact on progressive
  legislation and liberal reforms of next century

16
Literature

• Realism and naturalism thrive showing human
  nature and reflecting human experience
• Bret Harte
• Mark Twain
• William Dean Howells
• Stephen Crane
• Jack London
• Theodore Dreiser

17
Painting

• Winslow Homer
• Thomas Eakins
• James McNeil Whistle
• Mary Cassatt
• As the 19th century drew to a close, a group of
  social realists known as the Ashcan School
  painted scenes of everyday life in poor urban
  neighborhoods. Upsetting to artists were
  nonrepresentational paintings exhibted in the
  Armory Show in NYC in 1913. Art of this kind
  would be rejected until the 1950s.

18
Architecture

• Louis Sullivan
• Frank Lloyd Wright
• Daniel H. Burnham
• Frederick Law Olmsted

19
Music

• With growth of cities came increases in demand
  for musical performances and entertainment. By
  1900 most large cities had either a symphony
  orchestra, an opera house, or both.
• Great innovators of the era Jelly Roll Morton,
  Buddy Bolden, Scott Joplin
• Jazz introduced to American public
• Jazz, ragtime, blues gained popularity in the
  early 20th century as New Orleans performers
  headed north into urban areas like Memphis, St.
  Louis, Kansas City, Chicago

20
Popular Culture

• Mass Circulation of newspapers exposing scandals
  and sensationalism to new heights
• Amusements increase and leisure time increase
• Spectator Sports and Amateur sports gain
  acceptance