Chapter 18: Reading/Study Guide Terms Review

Thomas Edison (Electricity)

During his lifetime (late 1800s), Thomas Edison acquired a record number 1,093 patents (singly or jointly) and was the driving force behind such innovations as the phonograph, the incandescent light bulb and one of the earliest motion picture cameras. He also created the world's first industrial research laboratory. Known as the "Wizard of Menlo Park," for the New Jersey town where he did some of his best-known work, Edison had become one of the most famous men in the world by the time he was in his 30s. In addition to his talent for invention, Edison was also a successful manufacturer and businessman who was highly skilled at marketing his inventions-and himself-to the public. Electricity (and the lightbulb) changed society in one important way: it extended the work day. Factory owners began to realize that they could get a lot more mileage out of their capital investment if they could keep their machines running into their second shift, and even the third shift. It made the 24-hour-a-day delivery system possible, which made a huge difference in terms of accelerating the economy and is basically the foundation of our modern consumer economy.

J. D. Rockefeller

Founder of the Standard Oil Company, Rockefeller became one of the world's wealthiest men and a major philanthropist and Robber Barron. (The term "robber baron" began to be used in the early 1870s to describe a class of extremely wealthy businessmen who used ruthless and unethical business tactics to dominate vital industries.) Standard Oil of Ohio was Rockefeller's oil company, and was his pathway to extreme wealth. In the 1850's, crude oil was found to have perfect extracts for domestic lighting and heating, and when surplus supplies of crude oil was found in Titusville, Pennsylvania, Rockefeller, quickly took advantage of the business. Rockefeller and Standard Oil used a new strategy, called horizontal integration to pressure competitors, using predatory pricing, into joining him, and taking over almost the entire oil industry. Rockefeller controlled much of the American oil industry during the late 1800s and his business tactics made him one of the most notorious of the robber barons. He tried to keep a low profile, but muckrakers eventually exposed him as having corrupted the much of the petroleum business through monopolistic practices.

Muscular Christianity

In the late 1800s a fear about the softness of American society raised doubts about the capacity of the United States to carry out its imperial destiny. There was the view that young urban boys, in particular, needed socializing to become real, not effeminate, men. Physical health achieved by way of being a muscular Christian was also a condition of a successful life. Muscular Christianity was a protestant effort to promote physical fitness along with evangelization, which started as a result of the YMCA's foundation in 1851. However, Muscular Christianity soon merged with other racist and nativity ideas such as scientific breeding, known as Eugenics. At first, the idea was to select the healthiest stock. Within a short period of time, strong genes became identified with the white race. This idea of Eugenics, combined with Muscular Christianity put down strong roots in the United States as well as other countries, eventually taking its most repugnant form in Nazi Germany.

Jacob Riis

Jacob Riis was a Danish born journalist, who was an important character for Investigative journalism in the late 1800's. Riis used the newly invented flash-photography to capture people's lives and any injustices in society, which were then put in his famous book, How the Other Half Lives, (1890). Riis was important to showing society things they might not have seen before, and he even got recognition from Teddy Roosevelt, as a police commissioner, when he asked for better understanding about the problems in New York City and the country. Riis made the public and powerful people more aware of the harsh conditions in which poor people in the cities lived. The attention that this brought helped to cause the Progressives to reform the way things were done in American cities.

Jim Crow Laws

Jim Crow laws were a collection of state and local statutes that legalized racial segregation. The roots of Jim Crow laws began as early as 1865, immediately following the ratification of the 13th Amendment, which abolished slavery in the United States. Named after a Black minstrel show character, the laws—which existed for about 100 years, from the 1870s until 1968—were meant to marginalize African Americans by denying them the right to vote, hold jobs, get an education or other opportunities. Those who attempted to defy Jim Crow laws often faced arrest, fines, jail sentences, violence and death. Jim Crow laws forbade African Americans from living in white neighborhoods. Segregation was enforced for water fountains, bathrooms, entrances to buildings, restaurants, cemeteries, public parks, movie theaters, public pools, phone booths, hospitals, asylums, jails and residential homes for the elderly and handicapped. Probably the most important event that happened in favor for the Jim Crow Laws was the Plessy v Ferguson (1896) Supreme Court decision, which ruled "separate, but equal" to be ok, which allowed for more segregation.

Gospel of Wealth

The Gospel of Wealth was an idea made popular by industrialist Andrew Carnegie in 1889. In an article he wrote titled "Wealth", Carnegie described his belief that it was the moral responsibility of the rich (especially the self-made rich) to tackle wealth inequality by giving their surplus wealth to those who were less fortunate. Carnegie argued that the rich should give to any number of public institutions, including libraries, museums, and concert halls. However, Carnegie believed that rich people shouldn't just give their money to the poor all willy-nilly. Instead, the rich should give their money to institutions or ideas that promote the poor to cultivate "better" habits. The rich should not give money that has a "pauperizing tendency upon its recipients" - meaning that the rich shouldn't just give the poor money that the poor don't have to work for.

Lost Cause

The phrase many white southerners applied to their Civil War defeat. They viewed the war as a noble cause but only a temporary setback in the South's ultimate vindication. The Lost cause upheld the belief that Confederate society was more virtuous than the North and its soldiers more brave, but the south lost because the Yankees possessed overwhelming advantages in population, industry and arms. Defeat in the war, while bitter and painful, was also a glorious martyrdom for a people and a way of life. The Lost Cause carried with it an obligation to keep alive the memory of confederate glory. Southerners build elegant battlefield cemeteries and monument to celebrate confederate victories to perpetuate their perceived martyrdom.

Voter Suppression (disenfranchisement)

Using Jim Crow laws, voter suppression in the late 1800s included requirements to pass literacy tests or Constitutional quizzes, nearly impossible for uneducated former slaves. Other states instituted poll taxes, a financial burden that many poor African-American (and whites) were either unable or unwilling to pay. Some precincts even held "whites only" primaries in direct opposition to federal law. Attempts to break or protest Jim Crow voter suppression laws often met with deadly retribution. In fact, the intimidation and suppression campaign was so successful that only 3 percent of voting-age African-American southerners were registered to vote in 1940 An example of Voter Suppression was Louisianan's Grandfather Clause, which said men could vote only if they could prove that any one of their male relatives voted in any election PRIOR to 1867 --which completely disenfranchised African Americans, since the 15th Amendment (giving blacks the right to vote) wasn't passed until 1868.