THE GROWTH OF THE CITY
1876-1900
1. Rise of the City
A. 1860 - 1 out of 6 Americans lived in a city
1890 - 1 out of three
1900 - 76 cities with 50,000 or more inhabitants.
1890/1910 - 11,000,000 moved from farms to cities.
B. concentrated largely in the Northeast ; major urban and metropolitan areas included New York, Boston, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Chicago, St. Louis; this was the region where most of the nations industrial development was taking place.
C. With so many people crowded together, there were physical and social situations never before experienced by Americans.
1. Where would everyone live?
2. How would people get from place to place in a crowded city?
3. Who would provide city services, along with keeping law and order?
D. These problems generally had to be solved by politicians. It was inevitable with so many voters massed in one location some politicians took advantage of the opportunity to gain power and control through political corruption.
2. Reasons for Urbanization
A. Economic and social factors
1. Industrialization - machines and factories attracted workers.
2. Railroads ( transportation and distribution)
3. Influx of immigrants.
4. Farm and to city exodus.
B. Physical factors
1. Transportation - mass transit led to urban sprawl; trolleys, subways, bridges.
2. Public health - sewage systems, waste disposal,
C. Industry
1. Growth of Cities. Industry needed concentration of people as workers and as markets for products, so they located in cities.
D. People moved to the cities to get jobs. All seeking opportunities: in the process they then became urban consumers who depended on goods and services.
1. result was an enormous increase in service occupations and small businesses, as well as an increase in new products, to support the needs of the cities population.
3. Finding a Roof Overhead
A. race and class structures were reflected in housing patterns
B. The Rich - housing was no problem; the only inconvenience was that there was the absence of zoning laws, consequently an elegant mansion could be located next to a factory or slaughterhouse.
C. The Middle Class options:( increased ) had the choice of either buying a house on the outskirts of town - land was cheap and they had to commute or they could live in a centrally located boarding house where they shared a kitchen and dining room with several families.
1. the apartment: 1870 - first built in New York; modern conveniences such as built in kitchen range, elevator service, and hot-water heater.
2. the row house:( brownstones) basically the first condominiums. Very popular with the middle class families; each family could own its own home; they were affordable because construction costs were down because they took up little land and shared its side walls with other neighbors.
4. The Development of Tenements
A. The Poor - generally made up at least half a cities population. They lived in multi-family dwellings. Tenements usually developed as industry expanded; middle class families moved away from the factories for a better environment; their residences were converted into low cost housing shared by several families.First designed for working class families in New York they soon spread through out all industrialized cities.
1. The need to provide cheap housing vs. rising land costs, tenements soon became overcrowded, airless, filthy, disease ridden. People lived in cellars, divided rooms with no windows, stables , even outhouses were converted
2. Rents high for the kind of poverty they lived in. Building codes rarely enforced.
5. Attempts At Reform
A. New York, the largest city in the nation had the worse tenement buildings. They also were the first to initiate reform and pass laws to improve slum conditions.
B."dumbbell tenement" 1897
1. central venelation shaft to allow for an outside window for each room.
2. fire proof stairways, toilet for every two families.
3. new laws seemed ineffective. By 1900 tenements in New York were worse off than previously.
5. The Black Ghettos
A. end of the Civil War fewer than 5% of African-Americans lived in urban areas. (1910 -25% lived in industrial urban areas ) The largest percentage living in Washington, Chicago, New York, Philadelphia.
B. Until the 1890's urban blacks and whites often shared the same neighborhood. After 1890 strict racial segregation of housing laws passed in the South (Jim Crow Laws) increased racial tensions and prejudice in the North; spurred by increased competition for industrial jobs, brought about by de facto segregation, segregation supported by custom rather than law.
1. resulting in the segregation of urban areas; blacks being forced to colonize the worst sections of the city, and the very worst tenements.
2. at the same time encouraging them to develop their own commercial institutions to support ad provide services to blacks. It was a slow process, but it is the beginning of the rise of the black middle-class.
6. Transportation
A. New means of transportation was needed to move large numbers of workers to and from their jobs.
1. 1867- New York builds first elevated railway.
2. 1873- San Francisco installed first cable car.
3. 1897- Boston first subway.
7. Water and Sanitation
*By the turn of the century most major cities had installed water mains and were piping water directly to houses. Sanitation on the other hand was very difficult to handle.
8. Law and Order
*how to maintain law and order with the increase in crime that went along with the increase of population and the expansion of cities and slums. Violent crimes, pickpockets, shoplifters, counterfeits, gangs, as well as police abuse of power and corruption.
9. Fighting Fires
Chicago fire of 1871 killed 500, destroyed 18,000 buildings, and 100,000 homeless. Almost every major city had suffered a devastating fire during the 1870's and 1880's.
1. most houses were still built of wood.
2. existence of a volunteer rather than a salaried fire department.
3. 1853 - city of Cleveland first salaried fire department
4. 1877 - development of a automatic sprinkler system.
10. America improves city and services
A. The American city of the industrial age brought with it problems as well as wonders
1. skyscrapers
2. trolleys
3. giant bridges
B. Along with new wonders were attempts to make the city more livable. ( physical environment as well as the mind and spirit.)
1. as cities grew larger and more crowded, open space for recreation became important.
a. Fredrick Law Olmstead: 1850 designed Manhattan's Central Park.
1870's - planned landscaping for Wash. DC.
b. Coney Island - 1884/ Ferris wheel in Chicago 1893.
C. retailing innovations:
1.The Department store - Marshal Fields of Chicago
2. The Chain Store - Frank W. Woolworth
3. The Shopping Center: Cleveland 1890.
4. Restaurants/Short-order house
D. Settlement Houses
1. Jane AddamsChicago 1898 Set up by private reformers in slum neighborhoods. Provided classes in such subjects as English, health, crafts, drama, music, and painting.
a. emphasized social services
POLITICAL MACHINES
DURING THE GILDED AGE
The rapid rise of mushrooming of cities created tremendous problems and strains on local government overnight.
1. Local Government
1. Consisted of old line leadership that generally looked down on new comers.
2. A government structure that had no real leadership or clear responsibility for anything.
3. The powers of Gov't were divided among mayor, a city council, various judges, and independent boards.
4. absence of a responsible Gov't , combined with the sheer size of these new urban problems opened the way for new political structures.
2. Machine politics
A. The party machine worked on two levels.
1. provided services to the general population for their vote.
2. provided opportunities for business men in exchange for money.
a. George Washington Plunkett, precinct captain for Tammany Hall.
B. Stealing votes: When loyalties of the poor and working class did not carry an election for the local officials, political machines would turn to fraud.
C. Municipal graft: Once a political machine got its candidates into office there were numerous opportunities for making money.
1. padding bills
2. Boss Tweed / Tammany Hall
D. As long as municipal Gov'ts did not attach themselves to certain social needs, the majority of voters supported the machines that gave at least some help to the poor.
Feldmeth, Greg D., "The Growth of the City & Machine Politics," U.S. History Resources <..//gfeldmeth/USHistory.html/lec.precol.html>