Immigration & Urbanization

Immigration 1870-1910: 20 million

immigrants entered the US

Added to the labor pool

Added to the demand for housing

Added to the demand for goods

Eastern & Southern Europeans

About 14 million immigrants from Italy, Greece, Poland, Russia, Slavic states

Many were Catholic, Orthodox, or Jewish

Came because of job and land availability, to escape religious persecution, to escape a fixed class system, and/or to live in a democracy

Ellis Island New York Harbor

Used from 1892 to 1954 to process immigrants

Immigrants were medically inspected

Unhealthy quarantined or sent back to Europe (only about 2% were denied entry)

Now part of the Statue of Liberty National Monument

Statue of Liberty (1886)

The Know-Nothings The American Party

(1849-1860)

Nativists

Anti-Catholic

Opposed immigration

Played on prejudices and fears that immigrants would take jobs

American Protective Association

Founded in 1887 by Henry Bowers

Opposed Catholicism because Catholics obeyed the Pope above all other powers, including the government

Wanted to limit Catholic immigration, ban Catholics from teaching, holding public office

Also wanted to make understanding English a requisite for citizenship

Had faded out by 1900

Immigration Act of 1882

$.50 tax on each immigrant entering US to help pay costs of regulating immigration

Denied entry to “convicts, lunatics, idiots, and persons likely to become public charges”

Asian Immigrants Chinese: looking to

escape famine, unemployment, and violent rebellions

Often excluded from regular American society, so developed their own in “Chinatowns”

Some limited Japanese immigration

Angel Island In use 1910 – 1940

Processed over 1 million immigrants

Located in San Francisco Bay

75% of immigrants were detained for at least 2 weeks, some for up to 2 years

Workingman’s Party of California

1870s - 1900

Founded by Irish immigrant Denis Kearney

Opposed Chinese immigration and use of Chinese labor to build railroads

“The Chinese Must Go!”

Chinese Exclusion Acts Passed in 1882

Banned Chinese immigration for 10 years

Chinese already here could not become citizens

Renewed in 1892

Made permanent in 1902

Finally repealed in 1942

Led to a decline in Chinese population in US

Ethnic neighborhoods “Cultural pluralism”

Immigrants preferred to stick together, form neighborhoods where it was safe to speak native language, continue ethnic customs, practice their religion

These neighborhoods led to general distrust of immigrants by the native US population

“Melting Pot” or “Tossed Salad”?

Melting pot = assimilation of multiple cultures into a new, blended “American” culture

Tossed salad = many different cultures thrown together, but little blending – each culture stands out

Urbanization Between 1870 -1900: US

urban population soared from 10 million to 30 million

NYC: 800,000 in 1860, 3.5 million in 1900

Chicago: 109,000 in 1860, 1.6 million in 1900

Immigrants tended to stay in cities

Many poor farmers moved to cities for better paying jobs

Many freed slaves migrated to northern cities to seek new opportunities

Appeal of Cities More jobs available

Electric lighting

Running water and sewer

Abundance of goods

Variety of leisure activities

Adult Entertainment Vaudeville Theater: collection

of acts, including dancers, singers, acrobats, comedians, etc. (similar to “America’s Got Talent” but without judges)

Dance Halls: large venues with live bands playing dance music

Cabarets: bars or nightclubs which offered musical entertainment

Saloons: neighborhood bars where working men ate, drank, talked politics and discussed current events

Family Entertainment Museums

Libraries

Amusement Parks: NYC’s Coney Island became a resort area after Civil War, first “attraction” was a carousel that opened in 1876

Spectator sports: Boxing, horse racing, wrestling, professional baseball

Skyscrapers As cities became more

crowded, space became more valuable

Inventions like high-quality steel and the Otis elevator made going higher the most practical solution

Chicago architect Louis Sullivan generally credited with pioneering the “skyscraper”

Home Insurance Building

Chicago

Built in 1885

First to have a steel frame

10 stories (138 ft.)

2 floors added later

Designed by William LeBaron Jenney (who trained Louis Sullivan)

Demolished in 1931 because it was too small and wasted space!

Tallest Modern Buildings

Public Parks

Frederick Law Olmstead

1822 – 1903

Landscape architect

Designed many major urban green-spaces, including Central Park in NYC and parks in Chicago, Washington DC, and other cities

Also designed the grounds at Biltmore Estate in Asheville, NC

Mass transit Horsecars: railroad car pulled

along tracks by horses

Cable cars: railroad car pulled along tracks by underground cables (San Francisco, 1873)

Electric trolley car: developed in 1887 by Frank J. Sprague, first used in Richmond, VA

Elevated railroads: Used in Chicago starting in 1892

Subways: Boston in 1897, NYC in 1904

Major bridges, such as NYC’s Brooklyn Bridge (1883)

Changes in Shopping Bold new forms of

advertising products, using large, illustrated ads in newspapers & magazines

Department stores: John Wannamaker’s Grand Depot in Philadelphia

Chain stores: Woolworth’s (1879)

Mail-order catalogs: Montgomery Ward, Sears Roebuck

Upper Class “High Society”

Wealthiest families, primarily industrialists like the Rockefellers and Vanderbilts

Built palatial houses, clustered in downtown districts

Middle-Class Gentility

Doctors, lawyers, engineers, architects, managers, teachers

Lived in “streetcar suburbs” on edges of cities

Average salary = $1100/year

The Working Class

75% of urban population

Lived in tenement housing within easy walking distance of the industrial district

Average salary = $445/year

Urban problems Violent crime: murder rate

jumped 400% between 1880 and 1900; rate today is about ½ the rate of US in 1900

Pollution: especially of drinking water, but also of land and air

Disease: cholera, typhoid

Fire: Chicago (1871), Boston (1872), Baltimore (1904), San Francisco (1906, caused by earthquake)

Tenements Small, extremely crowded

apartment buildings Whole families often lived

in just one room, sometimes with only a single window for air

Up to a dozen families might share a single bathroom

Buildings were unsafe –hard to escape in a fire, little fresh air and close quarters led to spread of disease

Jacob Riis 1849 – 1914

Danish immigrant, social reformer, journalist, photographer

Wrote How the Other Half Lives (1890)

Documented horrors of life in the slums & tenements

Blamed alcohol for many of society’s ills

Jane Addams & the Social Gospel

1860 – 1935

Founded Hull House, a settlement house in Chicago

First woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize

“Social Gospel”: idea that Christians have a moral responsibility to fix society’s problems & help the less fortunate

Settlement Houses

Most famous settlement house = Chicago’s Hull House

Middle class “settlers” moved into working class neighborhoods to help provide education, meals, childcare, medical care, and general advice to immigrants and poor workers