Terms
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infrastructure
yeoman farmers planters commercial agriculture subsistence agriculture market based economy canal Erie Canal Railroads |
Industrialization
Eli Whitney McCormick Reaper Lowell System Irish Immigration German Immigration Nativism Know Nothing Party Labor Unions |
Professions
Horace Mann |
Postwar - War of 1812
Farmers of the Planter Class owned thousands of acres and rarely actually worked the ground themselves.
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When the War of 1812 ended in 1815, America began looking at ways to improve the infrastructure (roads and waterways used for travel). During this time America's economy would grew and its borders would stretch from one end of the continent at the Atlantic Ocean, all of the way to the Pacific Ocean. Americans moved more during this time period than they ever had in history, always looking for new opportunities and ways to make a living.
The lure of cheap land and plentiful jobs, as well as the promise of political and religious freedom led to millions of immigrants coming to America. Farms grew in places further west than ever before. States like Alabama and Mississippi began to be populated by small farmers that farmed forty acres or less called yeoman farmers. Also moving west were planters, planters were large farm owners who owned thousands of acres of land and owned slaves, yeoman farmers rarely owned slaves and often could not compete with large planters. |
Yeoman farmers owned small farms that barely raised enough to support the family that lived on them.
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As farming expanded in the South and Midwest, the Northeast experienced a surge or upswing in industrial construction, these labor-saving machines were water and steam powered reshaped the regions social and economic life. New England was transforming from a place where most work was done at home to a system where most of the people worked outside their home in mills and factories. Meanwhile the South wasn't changing at all, still had the same old agricultural centered economy as always.
The Market Revolution
Commercial Agriculture - producing more crops than you need to live so that you can sell the surplus or extra.
Subsistence Agriculture - only producing what you need to live.
Subsistence Agriculture - only producing what you need to live.
During the early and mid-1800s (19th century), agriculture began to shift from subsistence agriculture to commercial agriculture. The produced crops and raised livestock to sell to markets outside of their region. Farming for sale instead of consumption (eating it yourself), is often called a market based economy. Overall this led to a better standard of living for many Americans. In order to make a market economy work, there must be improvements made to the landscape such as roads, railroads, and canals. Canals are man made rivers usually built in order to be able ship goods from a region that did not have a railroad or natural river way.
In 1817, John C. Calhoun of South Carolina proposed that the U.S. should make a national system of roads and canals in order for America's economy to grow. An argument erupted over whether the U.S. government, state governments, or private corporations would be responsible for such improvements.
In 1807, Robert Livingston and Robert Fulton opened the country up for steamboats when they built the first commercial (for business) steamboat named the Clermont, now river travel could go downstream as well as upstream. Canals also sped up the growth of the market economy. The Erie Canal in central New York connected the Great Lakes and the Midwest to the Hudson River and New York City. It took eight years to build the Erie Canal, which was 40 feet wide and four feet deep. It was 363 miles long making it the longest canal in the world. This helped to add to an already growing economy in the North. From 1825 when the Erie Canal was finished, until ten years later, nearly 3,000 miles of canals were built, almost all of them in the North.
In 1807, Robert Livingston and Robert Fulton opened the country up for steamboats when they built the first commercial (for business) steamboat named the Clermont, now river travel could go downstream as well as upstream. Canals also sped up the growth of the market economy. The Erie Canal in central New York connected the Great Lakes and the Midwest to the Hudson River and New York City. It took eight years to build the Erie Canal, which was 40 feet wide and four feet deep. It was 363 miles long making it the longest canal in the world. This helped to add to an already growing economy in the North. From 1825 when the Erie Canal was finished, until ten years later, nearly 3,000 miles of canals were built, almost all of them in the North.
Railroads
The same year the Erie Canal was built, the world's first steam powered railway began operating in England. Within a twenty year span, the U.S. would add over 30,000 miles of railroad tracks, the majority of which were built in the North. Railroads could move more people and freight faster, further, and cheaper than wagons or boats.
Industrialization
The introduction of the steam engine ushered a new era (a new time) of industrialization. Mechanized factories, mills, and mines emerged in the North. New inventions were created in large numbers like never before. In 1844, Charles Goodyear discovered a way to vulcanize rubber which made it stronger and more durable in winter conditions. Shoes, hoses, and eventually tires were created from vulcanized rubber.
In 1792, Eli Whitney learned that it was very difficult to gin cotton (which means to separate the boll from the seeds. One person working all day could barely separate one pound of cotton a day. Whitney designed a machine that had nails on a roller that could separate the cotton from the seeds, he called it a cotton gin. Cotton gins proved to be fifty times more productive than a hand laborer. This made cotton the most profitable crop in the world. Cotton became America's number one export product. This new invention had negative results for slaves, with the ability to mechanically gin cotton, more crops were planted and thus more slaves were used in the South.
In 1792, Eli Whitney learned that it was very difficult to gin cotton (which means to separate the boll from the seeds. One person working all day could barely separate one pound of cotton a day. Whitney designed a machine that had nails on a roller that could separate the cotton from the seeds, he called it a cotton gin. Cotton gins proved to be fifty times more productive than a hand laborer. This made cotton the most profitable crop in the world. Cotton became America's number one export product. This new invention had negative results for slaves, with the ability to mechanically gin cotton, more crops were planted and thus more slaves were used in the South.
Eli Whitney
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One of the first cotton gins.
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Other industrial inventions that led to more efficient farming were the introduction of the steel plow and the McCormick Reaper, which was a horse drawn implement (farm machine) that could cut hay much faster than a person with a scythe (a handheld reaper like the character "death" carries). The McCormick Reaper was as important to farmers in the midwest and north as the cotton gin had been to planters in the South.
With the boom in cotton, textile mills where they spin wool into yarn and into clothing became a big business in New England. Textile mills were wage earning factories. A wage is money paid for doing a job, sometimes wages are hourly, but they can also be paid by the day, week, or month. In 1822, Francis Cabot Lowell, developed a new type of workplace. He built a large cotton mill at a village eight miles north of Boston. His system became known as the Lowell system, it was not just a factory that was centered on how fast cotton could be milled, it was an entire community that was centered around the success of the factory and making the job of looming cotton more efficient. Lowell hired women to learn and work the machines at the mill. The women stayed in small rooms or apartments near the mill where they also had access to a library, stores, and anything else they needed, very much like a college campus today, only instead of everything centered around an education, everything was centered around the mill and the women that worked there.
At first the Lowell system worked exactly as planned, but as time went on and the mill grew, the owners no longer took care of all the property they owned in the system. More profits should have meant that the buildings would be improved and more apartments built for the workers, but instead, the once quiet and peaceful small village at Lowell turned into an overcrowded and dirty industrial town. The required hours of working extended from seven in the morning until seven at night with only an hour for a lunch break and breakfast break. Because the women depended on the mill for everything, they often had no choice but to stay and work, this became known as industrial slavery (a figurative term because unlike slaves in the South, the women were paid wages and were technically free to leave anytime they wanted to).
At first the Lowell system worked exactly as planned, but as time went on and the mill grew, the owners no longer took care of all the property they owned in the system. More profits should have meant that the buildings would be improved and more apartments built for the workers, but instead, the once quiet and peaceful small village at Lowell turned into an overcrowded and dirty industrial town. The required hours of working extended from seven in the morning until seven at night with only an hour for a lunch break and breakfast break. Because the women depended on the mill for everything, they often had no choice but to stay and work, this became known as industrial slavery (a figurative term because unlike slaves in the South, the women were paid wages and were technically free to leave anytime they wanted to).
Immigration
The first half of the 19th century saw the largest influx of immigrants to the U.S. ever seen. People left their homes and everything they knew to find an opportunity to become something better than they could be in their home country. America offered jobs, higher wages, lower taxes, cheap and fertile land, religious freedom, and voting rights. From 1840 to 1860, immigrants became almost 15% of the total U.S. population.
One group that came to America during this time was the Irish. By the 1840s, over 1 out of 3 Irish depended on the harvest of potatoes to make a living. In 1845, a fungus destroyed the potato crop and triggered what became known as the Irish Potato Famine (famine means starvation or shortage of food). More than a million people died, and nearly 2 million left Ireland. By the 1850s, the Irish made up half of the populations of Boston and New York. In order to find cheap land to farm, many Irish moved west of the Mississippi River where they settled in groups. Most went to St. Louis, but some settled in Stoddard County. Because they were Catholic and would work about any job they could find, many became worried they would steal their jobs and treated the Irish very badly.
One group that came to America during this time was the Irish. By the 1840s, over 1 out of 3 Irish depended on the harvest of potatoes to make a living. In 1845, a fungus destroyed the potato crop and triggered what became known as the Irish Potato Famine (famine means starvation or shortage of food). More than a million people died, and nearly 2 million left Ireland. By the 1850s, the Irish made up half of the populations of Boston and New York. In order to find cheap land to farm, many Irish moved west of the Mississippi River where they settled in groups. Most went to St. Louis, but some settled in Stoddard County. Because they were Catholic and would work about any job they could find, many became worried they would steal their jobs and treated the Irish very badly.
Map showing where many Irish settled in the U.S.
Another group that came to America were Germans. They were nearly as numerous as the Irish and came during the same period of time as the Irish. Most of the Germans entered the country through New York and settled in cities across the North, often living in ethnic neighborhoods were other Germans lived. Some Germans, like the Irish settled the rural areas of Southeast Missouri, most settled in Cape and Bollinger Counties with very few settling in Stoddard County.
Nativism
Not all Americans welcomed the flood of immigrants in the 1840s and 1850s. Many people wanted to limit the number of immigrants that came to America, they were afraid that immigrants would do the same work as those born in the U.S., but for less money. Nativists were people in the U.S. that believed because they were born in the U.S. this somehow made them more American and they refused to support immigration or those who had already moved to the U.S. They would not support non-native born candidates for political office and refused to support Catholics running for any position of authority. They formed secret groups that fought behind the scenes to limit immigration and the rights of immigrants. The movement became large enough that it got the name, The Know Nothing Party, in honor of their secretive meetings. The Know Nothings wanted to limit immigration, bar immigrants from an public office, and wanted the process of becoming a citizen changed from five years to twenty-one.
Know Nothing Party banner
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Know Nothing Party newspaper
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Labor and Professions
As industrialization led to larger factories and more mass production of products, this put a demand on more labor to work in factories. Because the conditions for working in many of these places were bad, some began to form groups called labor unions. Labor Unions are members of a particular industry that band together and use their membership numbers to negotiate with business owners for better pay and safer working conditions. The number one tool of labor unions is the labor strike. Labor strikes are when members of the work force refuse to work until their demands are heard and at least some of them fixed. The idea was that halting production would get the business owners attention and make him come to the table to negotiate with the workers. Sometimes it worked, sometimes it did not.
As business grew and more Americans made more money than they ever had before, many sent their children to either college or to learn a specific trade or profession. Profession is a particular line of work where the person employed knows a lot about what they do and how to do it, usually they have a specific skill set to offer. One of the fasting growing professions of the early half of the 1800s was teaching. Horace Mann of Massachusetts promoted the idea of free education. Mann believed that public schools could transform the country's youth into disciplined good citizens. The North agreed with Mann and began creating schools all over the North. In order to meet the demand for teachers, Mann created "normal schools," or colleges that trained people how to become teachers.
Other professions such as law, medicine, and engineering became more in demand which led to more colleges and schools being created. Most of these schools were in the North.
Other professions such as law, medicine, and engineering became more in demand which led to more colleges and schools being created. Most of these schools were in the North.