Railroad: By 1900, there were 250,000 miles of railroad track laid. James J. Hill and Cornelius Vanderbilt were the railroad barons at the time, controlled up to 90% of the railroad at the time. Because of this, they could charge whatever price they wanted to people. However, they could cut deals for their rich buddies so they could travel at lower prices.
Railroad transport was very important as it moved resources from the west-to-east, east-to-west.
Railroad technology: Air brakes, refrigerated railcars, luxurious sleeping cars, electromagnetic braking systems, as well as dining cars.
Railroads also affected how Americans thought about time, people would measure the trip into how many hours it was instead of miles, and this is how time zones came about!
Improved communication inventions: Telephone made in 1876, telegraph.
Other inventions: Kodak Camera invented in 1888, Lewis Latimer improved on the lightbulb, giving it a threaded socket and an improved filament, automatic shoemaking machine.
Thomas Edison inventions: Telephone transmitters, storage battery, electric lightbulbs made in 1879, phonograph made in 1877
THE AGE OF BIG BUSINESS!
Oil was one of the biggest industries back then, and people were finding better, more efficient ways to get it out of the earth faster. Cars were becoming powered by gasoline which helped people get the oil faster and with more reason. Steel business was booming with all the railroads being built and in heavy use. Development of new manufacturing tools made steel very inexpensive.
The corporations grew larger. J.D. Rockefeller and his railroad business and Andrew Carnegie with his steel industry were becoming highly successful.
Many mergers happened at this time, since there many monopolies, people would combine businesses to form corporations to be more beneficial to both parties.
SHERMAN ANTITRUST ACT
This law was in 1890, and it sought to protect trade and commerce from unlawful restraint and commerce. However, it didn't fully define trusts or monopolies so people began to reinterpret the act.
INDUSTRIAL WORKERS!
In 1800's most working women were domestic servants, but then by the 1900's more than 1,000,000 women worked in the industry. But since no laws regulate women's salaries, they earned half of what men earned for the same work.
In 1900, a thousand children under the age of 16 were working for the industry. Many states began passing laws that children couldn't work until they were 12 and couldn't work more than 10 hours a day.
Unsatisfied workers formed labor unions so that they could get better working conditions and salaries for them.
CH. 19!
Theodore Roosevelt
-1902, he ordered the justice department to take legal action against certain trusts that had violated the Sherman Antitrust Act. He targeted the Northern Securities Company, a railroad monopoly. The trust was broken apart.
-He obtained a total of 25 legal charges against trusts in the beef, oil, and tobacco companies.
-He made the United Mine Workers have a normal work patterns so more people got more hours and more pay.
-He enforced the U.S. Forest Service in 1905 to help conserve natural resources. He reserved millions of acres of national forest.
William Howard Taft
-He won more antitrust in four years then Roosevelt did in seven.
-He favored the introduction of safety standers in the mines and railroad.
-In 1912, Roosevelt challenged Roosevelt in the election because he was disappointed in Taft. He thought that he was changed his ways. Roosevelt was angry that he didn’t get the nomination on the first ballot so he formed the Progressive party. Neither of them won, Wilson did.
Woodrow Wilson
-He achieved tariff reform in 1913.
-That same year, Congress also passed the Federal Reserve Act to regulate banking.
-In 1914 he established the Federal Trade Commission to investigate corporations for unfair trade practices.
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