THE URBANIZATION OF AMERICA Urbanization industrialization SIMULTANEOUS Cities

THE URBANIZATION OF AMERICA

• Urbanization & industrialization SIMULTANEOUS • Cities provide laborers, market • Shift from rural to urban • By 1900 s- 40% of US pop in cities, towns • By 1920 - more Americans in urban areas than rural • Who? • Immigrants from outside & inside US • From farms to cities- jobs • African Americans • 1897 -1930: 1 million southern blacks into northern/western cities

CITY CHANGE • Streetcars & mass transit • Transportation improvement growth • Horse-drawn electric, elevated RRs, subways, steel cable bridges • Brooklyn Bridge, 1883 • People live outside of city center • Escape pollution, poverty, crime • CON? • Segregation of workers by income, race, ethnicity • Working poor in older areas • Skyscrapers • From out to up • Otis elevator • 1885 - William Le Baron Jenny- 10 -story Home Insurance Co. Building

ETHNIC NEIGHBORHOODS • Middle-upper out, working poor into cities • Landlords divide apartments/housing into small, windowless rooms • slums, tenement housing • 4 k+/city block • Overcrowded, filthy, disease-ridden • Cholera, typhoid, TB • 1879 - NYC law for each bedroom to have a window • dumbbell tenements • Ethnic neighborhoods = continuation of culture • “ghettos” • Social clubs, churches, language, culture, newspapers, schools

RESIDENTIAL SUBURBS • Opposite of Europe • Rich in city, poor in outside • Movement OUT influenced by • Available land @ low cost • Inexpensive transportation • Low-cost construction • Ethnic/racial prejudice • American fondness for “green, ” privacy, detached/individual housing • Frederick Law Olmstead • Central Park, Biltmore, suburban communities • Curved roads, open spaces, “lawns”

CITY IMPROVEMENTS • By 1890 s, “City Beautiful” movement begins • Tree-lined blvds, public parks, public cultural attractions • Private companies operate services that develop cities • Streetcars, utilities • Increase in disease, filth, crime, waste, water pollution attempt to reform city government • Municipal water purification, sewer systems, waste disposal, street lights, police depts. , zoning laws to regulate development

IMMIGRANTS & POLITICAL MACHINES • Consolidation in business mirrored in urban politics • Political parties w/in cities under control of organized groups of politicians • Ex: Tammany Hall, Boss Tweed • Orders down, reward supporters with gov. jobs • Organize to coordinate needs of businesses, immigrants, underprivileged • In return? VOTE • The good: modern services into cities, parks, services • The bad: bribery, intimidation, graft, corruption, fraud • 65% of NYC public building fund into Tweed’s pockets

THE AWAKENING OF REFORM IN URBAN AMERICA

• Urban problems + poverty renewed social-consciousness of middle class • Books of Social Criticism • Henry George, 1879, Progress and Poverty • Critical look @ inequality in wealth via industrialization • Propose solution to poverty- all taxes replaced with single tax on land • Edward Bellamy, 1888, Looking Backward, 2000 -1887 • Vision of a future w/o poverty, greed, crime • shift in public opinion • Away from pure laissez-faire greater gov. regulation

SETTLEMENT HOUSES • Started by young, well-educated men & women (middle class) • Create foundation for job of “social worker” • Volunteers, political activists • Child-labor laws, housing reform, women’s rights • Frances Perkins, Harry Hopkins (1930 s- FDR/ND) • Settle in immigrant neighborhoods so could learn problems of immigrants • Live/work in settlement houses that help relieve effects of poverty • Provide social services for neighborhood • Taught English, early childhood education, industrial skills, theaters, musical schools • EX: Hull House, Jane Addams (Chicago, 1889)

SOCIAL GOSPEL • 1880 s-1890 s: Protestant clergy advocate social justice for poor • Must apply Xn principles to social problems & progressive reform • Walter Rauschenbusch (Baptist minister from NY) • Work in Hell’s Kitchen • Encourage middle-class Protestants to solve urban problems

WOMEN’S MOVEMENT • 1848 - Seneca Falls = launch of women’s suffrage • By 1890 - Stanton & Anthony found Nat’l Am. Woman Suffrage Assoc. • WY = first state to grant full suffrage to women (‘ 69) • 1900 - many states allow women to vote in local elections, own/control property after marriage • Temperance • Attract attention of women, urban reformers • Poverty, abuse, violence, crime • WCTU (1874)- Frances Willard • Antisaloon League (1893)- Carry A. Nation