UNIT 1: Gilded Age
unit 1: the gilded age
INDUSTRIALIZATION
LI: Explain the factors that contributed to the rise of industrialization in the 19th century.
SC:
CRASH COURSE: The Industrial Economy
Reading
"The Industrial Economy" p. 592-593
"Railroads and the National Market" p. 593-594
"The Spirit of Innovation" p.564
Assignment
Read through this collection of primary sources that features responses to Industrialization, then answer the analysis questions below.
1. On what grounds do critics complain about the emerging industrial order? How valid do you find their criticism?
2. What do the quotations suggest should be the proper role of government in the economy?
3. Is bigness in industry the result of manipulation or the natural workings of economic laws? Is bigness in industry bad and if so, why?
4. Big business's critics accused it of financial trickery, political corruption, the unscrupulous exercise of monopoly power, inhumanity toward labor, and disregard for the consumer. Defenders stressed big business's innovations--economies of scale, vertical and horizontal integration, rationalization of American industry, technical innovation, and promotion of efficient organization, capitalization, and research. Which argument do you find more persuasive?
THE MEN WHO BUILT AMERICA
LI: Provide and evaluate examples of social and political leadership in American history.
SC:
Reading
"The Rise of Andrew Carnegie" p. 596-597
"The Triumph of John D. Rockefeller" p. 599
Assignment
Read this handout covering industrial leaders in America and answer the questions below.
Who was known as the richest man in history? How did he make his fortune?
What term describes a situation where one company controls an entire industry and is so big and powerful that all of its competitors are destroyed?
J.P. Morgan was well known for restructuring businesses that had failed. What term was coined to describe this process?
What name was given to industrialists who controlled much of the nation’s wealth? Do you believe this was a fair term to use to describe them? Why or why not?
Name five institutions that prospered because of charitable contributions from Rockefeller, Carnegie, and Morgan. Do you think their charitable contributions made up for the way these men made their fortunes?
Who is a modern-day person you think can be compared with these 19th century industrialists? Why?
THE OCTOPUS
LI: Analyze the political and social responses to industrialization.
SC:
Reading
"The Octopus: A Story of California (1901)"
"STANDARD OIL COMPANY OF NEW JERSEY et al. v. UNITED STATES"
Assignment
Analyze this cartoon by answering the questions below.
What do the tentacles represent?
How would you describe the facial expression on the octopus?
Based on the cartoon, what is Standard Oil’s next intent?
How does this cartoon illustrate the monopolies that Standard Oil was accused of creating?
Next, analyze this second cartoon by answer the following questions.
What is the message of this cartoon?
How does the message of this cartoon compare to the first cartoon?
What similarities can be drawn between railroads in the Gilded Age and Frankenstein's Monster?
THE MEN WHO REALLY BUILT AMERICA
LI: Describe the economic responses to industrialization and the emergence of the American labor movement.
SC:
Reading
"Workers' Freedom in an Industrial Age" p. 600-601
"Sunshine and Shadow: Increasing Wealth and Poverty" p. 601-602
Assignment
View the images in the Jacob Riis' collection "How the Other Half Lives" and respond to the prompt below in a well written paragraph.
What can we infer about the gilded age given your knowledge of history and these images?
THE WEST
LI: Analyze the causes and effects of the expansion of the United States.
SC:
CRASH COURSE: Westward Expansion
Reading
"Farming on the Middle Border" p. 604-605
"The Cowboy and the Corporate West" 606-609
Assignment
Read two accounts about the Homestead Strike, one from Emma Goldman and a second from Henry Frick. Then consider the timeline of the strike when you answer the questions below.
How are Goldman and Frick’s claims about the Homestead strike different?
Whose claim is more believable? Why?
IMMIGRATION
LI: Analyze the changes in the political, social, and economic conditions of immigrant groups.
SC:
CRASH COURSE: Growth, Cities, and Immigration
Reading
"Timeline of Chinese Immigration and Exclusion"
Assignment
Complete a graphic organizer by analyzing three documents; a political cartoon, a speech to workingmen of San Francisco, and an autobiography of Lee Chew.
After completing the graphic organizer respond to the prompt below in a well-written paragraph.
Why did Americans pass the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882?
THE WEST AND THE INDIANS
LI: Identify and discuss the influences of American Indians on the history and culture of the United States.
SC:
Reading
"The Subjugation of the Plains Indians" p. 610-611
"Let Me Be a Free Man" p.611-612
Assignment
Read the sources to answer the corresponding analysis questions.
According to the textbook, what caused conflict between the Lakota Sioux and the U.S. government?
Who started the Battle of Little Bighorn?
Why did Custer lose?
Do you think this account is an accurate description of the Battle of Little Bighorn? Why or Why not?
Who wrote this report? What was his purpose? When was it written?
According to this document, what was the cause of conflict between Indians of the Sioux nation and the U.S. Government?
Why would Cameron write: “The accidental discovery of gold on the western border of the Sioux reservation, and the settlement of our people there, have not caused this war?”
How does Cameron describe the Sioux Indians who he believes are attacking white settlements?
What are the similarities and differences between this report and the textbook?
What type of document is this? When was it written? Why was it written?
According to Kate Bighead, what caused the conflict between the U.S. government and Native American tribes?
What are two differences between Bighead’s account and the Cameron report?
Which of the 2 documents – the Cameron report or the Kate Bighead interview – do you think is most trustworthy? Why?
INDIANS AND CITIZENSHIP
LI: Discuss the impact of forced assimilation on the land, cultural practices, and identity of American Indians.
SC:
Reading
"Remaking Indian Life" p. 614-615
Assignment
Read each document and answer the corresponding analysis questions.
Document A: Newspaper (Excerpt)
Who seems to be providing the information included in this article?
How might the sources for the article influence the content of the article?
Based on this document, what was the purpose of the Carlisle School?
Document B: Richard H. Pratt (Excerpt)
Who was Richard H. Pratt?
What was Pratt’s attitude toward Native Americans? Provide evidence from the document to support your claim.
What do you think Pratt meant when he said, “Kill the Indian in him, and save the man”? Find two examples from the document showing how the Carlisle Indian Industrial School tried to accomplish this.
How were Pratt’s goals for the Carlisle School similar to previous federal policies of removing Native American tribes from their lands and waging war against them? How were they different?
Based on this document, what was the purpose of the Carlisle School?
Document C: Ellis B. Childers (Excerpt)
Who was Ellis B. Childers? What kind of document is this?
What was Childers’s tone regarding the teachers at Carlisle? Provide evidence from the document to support your claim.
This article was written in the official school newspaper. How might that have influenced what Childers wrote?
How does the description of the Carlisle Indian Industrial School in this document compare with the description in Document B? Provide two or three similarities or differences.
Based on this document, what was the purpose of the Carlisle School?
Document D: Luther Standing Bear (Excerpt)
Who was Luther Standing Bear?
What were some of the changes the Carlisle teachers forced Luther Standing Bear and his fellow students to make?
According to Luther Standing Bear, what happened as a result of these changes?
How does Luther Standing Bear’s description of the Carlisle School compare to Ellis Childers’s description?
Based on this document, what was the purpose of the Carlisle School?
WOUNDED KNEE
LI: Identify and discuss the influences of American Indians on the history and culture of the United States.
SC:
Reading
"The Ghost Dance and Wounded Knee" p. 616-617
Assignment
Read two accounts of the Battle of Wounded Knee, one from a Black Elk and another from President Harrison, then answer the questions below.
What were some of the atrocities that Black Elk described?
How does Black Elk’s description of the events differ from President Harrison’s account?
In what ways did President Harrison justify the Battle of Wounded Knee?
Next, read a collection of primary sources relating to the various indian policies to answer the analysis questions below.
How would you explain the depth of hostility felt by many white Americans toward the Indians?
What is the goal of the Dawes plan? Do you approve or disapprove of the plan? Why?
THE MYTH OF THE WILD WEST
LI: Analyze ways in which language, literature, the arts, traditions, beliefs, values, and behavior patterns of diverse cultures have enriched American society.
SC:
Reading
"How the sombrero became the cowboy hat"
"Myth, Reality, and the Wild West" p. 619
Assignment
THE GILDED AGE
LI: Analyze the role of government policy in the economic development of the modern United States.
SC:
CRASH COURSE: Gilded Age Politics
Reading
"Politics in a Gilded Age" p. 619-620
"The Corruption of Politics" p. 620-621
"The Politics of Dead Center" p. 621-622
Assignment
Use the primary sources to complete the graphic organizer.
Then, in a well-written short essay (Three paragraphs) compose a response to the following prompt:
Did the government help the wealthy but not other Americans? Choose at least 6 of the primary sources to support your answer.
SOCIAL DARWINISM
LI: Analyze ways in which language, literature, the arts, traditions, beliefs, values, and behavior patterns of diverse cultures have enriched American society.
SC:
Reading
"Freedom, Inequality, and Democracy" p. 624-625
"Social Darwinism in America" p. 625-626
Assignment
LIBERTY OF CONTRACT
LI: Identify the impact of landmark United States Supreme Court cases, including Plessy v. Ferguson and Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka.
SC:
Reading
"Liberty of Contract" p. 626-627
"The Courts and Freedom" p. 627-628
Assignment
AMERICAN LABOR
LI: Trace the development and expansion of political, civil, and economic rights.
SC:
Reading
"The Overwhelming Labor Question" p. 628-629
"The Knights of Labor and the 'Conditions Essential to Liberty'" p. 629-630
Assignment
THE HAYMARKET AFFAIR
LI: Analyze the political and social responses to industrialization.
SC:
Reading
"The Haymarket Affair" p. 633-634
"Labor and Politics" p. 634-635
Assignment
Use this document concerning anarchism and the Haymarket Affair to answer the critical thinking questions below.
Explain why a historian might think that this passage alone does not provide enough evidence to fully understand the effect of the Haymarket Affair on the growth of anarchism?
Three documents are described below. Explain whether each document could be used to support this newspaper’s claims about the extent of anarchist activity in the U.S. in the late 1800s and early 1900s?
An article in an anarchist newspaper from 1910 describing steady growth in the anarchist movement over the previous 40 years.
An editorial in the Chicago Tribune a few days after the Haymarket bombing about the sudden and growing danger of anarchism throughout the United States.
Statistics on the growth of labor union membership from 1888-1908
Use the cartoon and the information provided to answer the analysis questions.
Does this cartoon approve of Altgeld’s pardon?
Which two of the background facts might help explain why the cartoonist depicted Altgeld’s pardon in this way?