The Machine
Age
1877-1920
Introduction: Industrialization increased significantly between 1877 and 1920 in the United States effecting the standard of living and the life of everyday Americans – highlighted by Edison, Ford, and the du Pont family. Electricity: Edison "We will make electricity so cheap that only the rich will burn candles."
Thomas Edison founded the Edison Electric Light Company (1878), perfected the incandescent bulb, and devised a power generation and distribution system. While George Westinghouse improved and provided competition to lower the cost (price) of the lamp.
Automobile: Ford “When I am through, everyone will be able to afford one and about everyone will have one.” Henry Ford, founder of the Ford Motor Company (1903), used the assembly line methods in the automobile
industry make cars more readily available – Model T (1908). Chemical Industry: “We Farm with Dynamite”
Started in 1802 the du Pont company primarily manufactured gunpowder (provided 50% of the gunpowder to the Union during Civil War) but between 1902 and 1912 broadened production into fertilizers, textiles, and rubber.
Southern Industry:
Industrialization also aided the growth of southern textile and tobacco industry as new machines introduced in the late nineteenth century altered the economy and everyday life.
Women & Children:
Employers cut wages by hiring more women, particularly for clerical and sales positions and a larger number of children began working in nonagricultural jobs.
Why employ women and children?
Repetitive tasks dulled concentration, often resulting in serious injury while employers believed in the “iron law of wages” which allowed them to pay their workers as little as possible.
Reforms:
Reforms were slow as the Supreme Court overturned most hour laws, but in Muller v. Oregon, it allowed limiting women to ten hour days, citing their health as a matter of public interest. (Laundry factory)
Union Movement:
As workers were forced to submit to the demands of the factory, machine, and time clock the desire for better wages, hours, and working conditions pushed workers into unions.
Following the Panic of 1873, the year 1877 witnessed a violent series of strikes aimed at the railroads. Hard times followed as the strikers enjoyed the sympathy of other workers.
The only labor organization to survive the depression of 1873 was the Knights of Labor, advocated a harmony of interests among its members. Because the union opposed strikes, it had little bargaining power.
In 1886, a demonstration (8 hour work day) at Haymarket
Square (Chicago) erupted into a riot. It was the largest
spontaneous labor demonstration in the country’s history but ended in the death of seven and injured over sixty others. This drew attention to labor’s growing discontent but also revived middle-class fears of unions.
American Federation of Labor:
The American Federation of Labor emerged as the major union (140,000 strong). A craft union, the AFL pressed for
shorter hours and the right to bargain collectively.
These dramatic labor struggles in the half century
following the Civil War make it easy to forget that only a small fraction of American wage workers belonged to unions.
Most Unions excluded women and many excluded immigrant and black workers. Tensions increased when these workers served as strikebreakers.
Standards of Living:
Products once considered luxuries became
increasingly available to middle-class Americans during the late nineteenth century.
By sending children and women into the labor force, families attempted to participate in the new consumer economy – for most it was still out of reach.
Wage increases meant little because the cost of living rose faster than wages.
Higher Life Expectancy:
Technological and medical advances extended life spans during this time period as death dropped 24%. Nevertheless, people found new ways to die…(heart disease, cancer, automobile accidents) as the fast paced
urban lifestyle took hold.
Conveniences:
Not only was social mobility seemingly more accessible
(public education) but amenities and luxuries seemed more
available than in the previous half-century.
The flush toilet, which became a standard fixture in
middle-class urban homes in the 1890s, caused a shift in habits and attitudes (1890, germ theory).
Processed and preservation of food was changed by the mass-production of tin cans along with the advent of refrigerated railroad cars made available a wider variety of foods to different areas of the country.
This availability of new foods also inspired health reforms to correct he American diet. The working class spent nearly half of their income on food.
Sewing machines led to mass-produced ready made
clothes at low costs and uniform sizes, sparking an
interest in fashions
Department and chain stores (the first was the Great
Atlantic & Pacific Tea Company – A&P)fueled consumerism.
Advertising helped persuade large groups of people to buy a specific product. Advertisers, mostly through newspapers, were charged with creating consumers who were loyal to a particular brand – called ‘consumption communities’.
Role of Corporations:
Corporations proved to be the best instruments to raise capitals for industrial expansion, and by 1900 two-thirds of all goods manufactured in the United States were produced by corporate firms (GE, American Tobacco Company). Courts defined corporations as individuals and protected them under the Fourteenth Amendment – providing
equal rights under the law in each state. Consolidation:
Between late 1880s and early 1900s, as a downward swing in the economy threatened profits, an widespread business consolidation swept the country.
This started with Pools, or cooperative agreements among firms that manufactured the same product or service. Congress outlawed pools with the Interstate Commerce Act of 1887.
Trust: a legal arrangement whereby a responsible individual or board would manage the financial affairs of a person unwilling or able to do so.
John D. Rockefeller (Standard Oil Company), used a “trust” to achieve horizontal integration of the petroleum industry – by acquiring similar companies – and created a Holding Companies that controlled the market. By 1898, Rockefeller’s Standard Oil Holding Company refined 84% of all oil produced in the United States.
The Merger movement created a new form of businessman, one whose vocation was financial organizing rather than production of a good or service. (J.P. Morgan). Financiers sold stock and borrowed from banks, driving the trading of stocks to a feverish level.
Social Darwinism:
Businessmen subscribed to Social Darwinism – survival of the fittest, turning the theory of natural selection into laissez faire economics. (monopolies)
Government Assistance:
Businessmen wanted government help in the form of subsidies, loans, and tariffs (on foreign goods). They denounced, however, government efforts to legislate working hours of regulate factory conditions for labor.
Opposing Voices:
While defenders insisted that big business was a natural and efficient
outcome of economic development, critics charged that these forms interfered with the American tradition of independence and opportunity and unlined the growing fear of monopolies.
Antitrust Legislation:
A few state governments moved to limit monopolies, and in 1890 Congress passed the Sherman Anti-Trust Act. The law was vague and had little
immediate effect on trusts since the courts rendered pro-business decisions. Now with the immense changes that made the United States an Industrialized
Nation between 1877 and 1920, it seemed that American strength now rested in its industry and urban centers.
