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Industrialization Unit 1: Founding a Nation

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IndustrializationUnit 1: Founding a Nation

Using the section provided in your guided notes, take a moment to reflect on this cartoon. What

does it say about the consequences of the Industrial Revolution, both technological and

social?

An IntroductionThe  United  States  went  from  an  almost  entirely  agricultural  nation  to  an  industrial  

force  by  the  1920’s,  largely  in  part  to  the  country’s  wealth  of  natural  resources,  abundant  labor  supply  found  in  its  growing  population,  and  business  friendly  government  policies.    A  series  of  important  innovations  and  inventions  over  the  19th  and  early  20th  century  would  dramatically  change  the  United  States  in  ways  that  still  impact  us  today.    The  Industrial  Revolution  is  this  period  of  the  US’  increased  ability  to  harness  the  power  of  its  resources  in  the  development  of  mass  production,  improved  technology,  and  transformation  of  American  society.      

So  what  about  the  cartoon?    The  Industrial  Revolution  brought  about  signiEicant  advances  in  technology,  some  of  which  would  be  used  to  create  entirely  new  types  of  products,  such  as  the  example  in  the  cartoon.    It  is  amazing  to  think  about  how  a  loom  could  have  possibly  led  to  computer  technology,  but  small  improvements  like  this,  changed  our  lives  forever.    Did  you  notice  the  man  on  the  right,  however?    Technology  advances  production  and  makes  things  much  easier  to  produce,  but  it  has  also  made  this  man  essentially  obsolete.    The  Industrial  Revolution  changed  many  things  for  the  better,  but  it  also  dramatically  altered  the  lives  of  people  in  ways  somewhat  unintended.    While  we  will  explore  the  social,  political,  and  economic  consequences  in  greater  detail  in  unit  2,  please  keep  these  factors  in  mind  as  we  explore  the  products  of  the  Industrial  Revolution.  

Industrialization-­‐

Inventions that Transformed Society

The Cotton Gin

The cotton gin was one of the most important agricultural products created for the farmers in the South. Invented by Eli Whitney in 1793, the cotton gin sped up the processing of cotton, which meant more cotton could be picked from the fields and shipped to manufacturers faster than ever. This not only created a greater demand for cotton, but for the slave labor as well. This invention would greatly transform the Southern economy, which now boasted “King Cotton” as their new cash crop.

Inventions that Transformed Society

Factories (Not quite an invention, but an important step forward)

This cotton had to be shipped somewhere, and most of it went to manufacturers in the North for production of cloth for clothing and other goods. Most of the cotton was spun into cloth no longer in homes, as was the case for centuries, but in factories where groups of women could work at the same time spinning cotton into cloth with the help of the spinning jenny and later the spinning mule, which made cloth production faster. Factories began to pop up for the production of other manufactured goods, with new machinery that made skilled laborers unnecessary, which meant jobs could now be done more quickly and for a cheaper cost. (Think back to the cartoon). Factories would become much more prominent in the Northern economies than in the Southern.

Inventions that Transformed Society

The Steamboat

How would those raw and manufactured goods get from one place to another? Created by Robert Fulton in 1807, the steamboat would make shipping of both raw and manufactured goods quicker, allowing more to be shipped up and down rivers throughout the US, which in turn made shipping cheaper. What if they didn’t have a river? Canals were built instead. By the 1840’s over 3,300 miles of canals were created for this purpose.

Inventions that Transformed Society

Steam Trains and Railways

The steam engine was created in England, and improved by James Watt in the late 18

th century.

As a result of these improvements, the development of steam locomotives was made possible. The first US built steam locomotive was the Tom Thumb made by Peter Cooper in 1830. As trains began to improve, they became more and more useful in shipping, and as a result, the development of railroads began to take place. Laying track is usually much quicker than building a canal, land transportation is now much easier, and winter travel is possible. By the 1850’s over 9,000 miles of tracks were laid across the country, and by 1869 the transcontinental railroad AKA the Pacific Railroad is completed, running from Omaha, Nebraska to Sacramento, CA. Existing Routes from Nebraska connected the railroad to the East, and routes were constructed to link Sacramento to San Francisco.

The Tom Thumb didn’t prove to be very fast, losing in a race against a horse!

What does “transcontinental” mean?

Inventions that Transformed Society

Telegraph and Morse Code

But railroads and trains don’t become very efficient, without the aid of the telegraph, invented by Samuel B. Morse in 1837. The telegraph allowed for almost instant communication across great distances that were connected by wire. Coded messages could be relayed back and forth via the Morse Code, named for Samuel, and translators of this code could now write down important communications. Businesses could now communicate prices, and railroads could keep trains moving regularly and warn engineers of potential hazards ahead.

Let’s take a Moment to Reflect

On your guided notes in the section provided take a moment to answer this prompt. Once you have written your answer, turn to a partner next to you and discuss what you wrote. We will discuss as a class when you are finished.

Since we have just completed our lesson on the Civil War, how influential do you think the Industrial Revolution was in the war’s outcome? In what ways did the Union enjoy an advantage over the Confederacy?

Did you Notice?

When thinking about the war did you notice the highlighted points?

During the Civil War the Union enjoyed more advantages, thanks to its industrial economy. While the South was rural and heavily reliant on agriculture, the North had factories, easily transformed for wartime production, more people, more food production (rather than tobacco and cotton), and a more extensive railroad system. The North could blockade the South and prevent them from receiving manufactured goods that had to be shipped in from outside. And Union riverboats could divide the Confederacy via the Mississippi River.

Let’s Take a Moment to Reflect

But what about the other way around?

We now know how industrialization impacted the war, using your own knowledge can you think of any ways the war itself had an impact on industrialization? Share your thought with your partner, write down anything you come up with together.

How About This?

War almost always creates improvements in technology, as both sides attempt to find advantages where they can, the Civil War was no exception. Some of the wartime innovations of the Civil War included the rifle, minie ball (more destructive than earlier bullets), improved hand grenades and land mines, as well as improved ironclad ships, which made wooden ships obsolete (could resist burning, splinter wooden ships, resist cannon fire).

Natural Resources

As I mentioned earlier, natural resources played an important role in the country’s ability to industrialize on a scale comparable, if not beyond Europe’s ability. The latter half of America’s industrial revolution would be dependent on these resources, and the processes to make them useful.

Natural ResourcesOil

The US had and still has oil, but its importance was not realized until the latter half of the 19th century. The ability to drill for oil in the earth via the steam engine (yes, another important use for the steam engine) thanks to Edwin L. Drake made drilling more practical. Oil was used to produce Kerosene, which was used to light lamps. Gasoline, a byproduct of oil refining, became indispensable once the automobile was popularized.

First Oil Drill, Titusville PA.

Natural ResourcesSteel and the Bessemer Process

Coal and iron was abundant in the US. When heated and injected with air, carbon and other impurities can be extracted from iron, and the resulting product is steel, which is lighter, stronger, and more flexible. The Bessemer process, developed by Henry Bessemer and William Kelly in the 1850’s would make the process of converting iron into steel much more efficient, and by 1880, 90% of steel was produced in this manner. Steel would be used to build railroads, barbed wire, agricultural machinery, and soon building. Bridges could be longer and stronger, while skyscrapers were now possible.

Construction of the Brooklyn Bridge

Bessemer Process

Natural ResourcesElectricity By the late 19th century, the ability to generate electricity with the aid of coal or water and harness that power would transform the United States forever. Businesses now had the ability to run machines using electric power and the creation of a system to disperse electricity across distances meant they were no longer restricted in where they could build their factories and cities could now spread out and grow.

West End Street Railroad Co.’s Central Power Station. Boston MA.

More Inventions that Transformed Society

As a result of harnessing electricity…

Telephone- The telegraph would eventually be replaced by the telephone, invented by Alexander Graham Bell in 1867. The telephone advanced communication even further, as now communication by voice was now possible, and people no longer needed to rely on Morse code and translated messages. Communication became that much quicker.

Lightbulb- Electricity had been known about for years, but it didn’t mean much to the individual until Thomas Edison created the first working light bulb, which would slowly replace kerosene lamps and bring electricity into the home.

Let’s Take a Moment to Reflect

These are just a few of the products of industrialization of the United States. In our next unit, we will be revisiting some of these improvements, and how they continued to influence peoples’ lives in the 20th century.

So now, take a moment to make a prediction, as we have yet to really examine the impacts of these inventions in detail, based on your own knowledge and what we have examined today, how revolutionary was the Industrial Revolution? What are your predictions for the next unit? How do you think these will impact society, the environment/landscape, and business in the early 20th century? Site examples from the notes/lecture as well as your own knowledge.