The Development of Industrial America 1870-1900
From the era of Reconstruction to the end of the 19th century, the United States underwent an
economic transformation marked by the maturing of the industrial economy, the rapid expansion of big
business, the development of large-scale agriculture, and the rise of national labor unions and industrial
conflict.
An outburst of technological innovation in the late 19th century fueled this headlong economic
growth. However, the accompanying rise of the American corporation and the advent of big business
resulted in a concentration of the nation's productive capacities in fewer and fewer hands.
Mechanization brought farming into the realm of big business as well, making the United States the
world's premier food producer--a position it has never surrendered. But still the land hunger of white
Americans continued unabated. This led to wars against the Native Americans of the Plains and the
"second great removal" of indigenous peoples from their ancient homelands.
Indispensable to this growth and development were an unprecedented surge in immigration
and urbanization after the Civil War. American society was in transition. Immigrants arriving from
southern and eastern Europe, from Asia, Mexico, and Central America, were creating a new American
mosaic. And the power of Anglo-Saxon Protestants--once so dominant--began to wane.
What many thought of as progress, however, others regarded with apprehension. Agricultural
modernization disrupted family farms, for example, provoking the country's farmers to organize prote:
movements as never before. And the social problems that accompanied the nation's industrial
development fueled the rise of national labor unions and unprecedented clashes between capital and
labor. This discontent captured the attention of reformers and politicians who began to challenge
traditional party politics through third-party movements.
1. What are the main contributing factors to industrial development? Choose one and
explain why you think it played a large factor in shifting America?
2. Why do you think that America began to shift to a more industrial type of economy
toward the end of the 20th Century?
3. How might you predict that this would affect the future direction that the U. S. would
begin to approach their role in the world?