Immigration

1. What major areas or countries of the world were immigrants coming from?
     Some of the major areas of the U.S. that immigrants were coming from was the East coast (California) and the West coast (New York, Long Island, Ellis Island)

2. What were the two major immigration processing stations in the United States?
     On Ellis Island, the immigrants had to go through a physical test, and be questioned by people asking about themselves and how much money they had with them.  On Angel Island, they were questioned harshly and had to stay in disgusting quarters for long periods of time.

3. Define Melting Pot.
     A melting pot is like a mixture of people from different cultures and races that blend by leaving their native cultures and languages behind and try to become more like U.S. citizens.

4. Define Nativism.
     Nativism is the favoritism of native-born americans, and they usually create anti-immigrant groups and they dont like immigrants (Asian, Latin, Slav)

5. According to the Immigration Restriction League, list the desirable immigrants.
     British, German and Scandinavian immigrants were welcomed by the Immigration Restriction League.

6. According to the Immigration Restriction League, list the “wrong” immigrants.
      Asian, Latin and Slav groups were un-welcomed and looked down upon by the group.


7. Why did nativists’ sometimes object to an immigrant’s religious background?
     The nativists' objected to immigrant religious backgrounds because they would undermine the democratic institute.

8. Why was the Chinese Exclusion Act passed?
     The act was passed because a lot of jobs were going to the Chines and they thought that the Chinese were talking all of the jobs, so the act was passed so that no more chinese could come into the country to take other peoples jobs.

Robber Baron Document Rankings

For each document, justify in a sentence or two why you believe it best represents the era you have been studying. Be sure to put the number of the document to the right of "document number." NOTE: There are no right or wrong answers with this assignment. Your justification is the key to making the documents "correct."

Power Rank 1:  Document Number: 1

Why do you believe it best represents the era you have been studying?.
     This shows exactly what happened and ow everything got started.  How someone saw how a few individuals got into the big business and took over.

Power Rank 2:  Document Number: 5

Why do you believe it best represents the era you have been studying?
     It is a cartoon, but I think that it portrays what the robber barrons were actually doing.  They took over the capital and it was an industry instead of a governing capital.

Power Rank 3:  Document Number: 14

Why do you believe it best represents the era you have been studying?
     Sometimes the law can be hard for one, but overall, it is good for everyone, or so it is said.  This document shows how there was survival of the fittest durring this time.

Power Rank 4:  Document Number: 10

Why do you believe it best represents the era you have been studying?
     There is depression and labor and it is a hard time but it cant be helped if the country is growing strong.

Power Rank 5:  Document Number: 8

Why do you believe it best represents the era you have been studying?

     It is one story out of many about the start of the industrial age.

Sorry Its late :(

Age of Railroads

1. What problems did employees of the railroad companies face?
People who worked for the railroad companies faced attacks from Indian tribes, disease and accidents.  When the stats came out in 1888, casualties were over 2,000 and more than 20,000 were injured.  It was very dangerous working on the railroads.  

   2. What was it like to live as a Pullman employee in the town of Pullman?
All employees of Pullman got to live in nice little towns that had all the basic necessities.  Small houses or apartments with windows in every room.  Windows were a luxury for city dwellers.  They were clean towns and gave them the use of doctor offices, shops and even an athletic field. 

   3. Who was involved in Crédit Mobilier, and what was the purpose of this company?
Stockholders in the Union Pacific Railroad formed a construction company (Credit Mobilier) to cheat companies into laying track two to three times the actual cost of what it should have been and the stockholder took the money they had collected.  They had taken up to 23$ million in stocks, bonds and cash and split it between a bunch of congress men....

   4. In what ways did the railroad companies use their power to hurt farmers?
The R.R. companies took advantage of the weaker farmers and made agreements with the government that did not aid or give the farmers opinion or side of things.  The R.R. companies were selling the land ment for farmers to other businesses.  

   5. Why didn’t the decision in the Munn v. Illinois case succeed in checking the power of the railroads?
The decision in the Munn v. Illinois gave the states the right to regulate the R.R.s for the benefit of farmers and consumers.  This didn't exactly help in checking the power of the railroads, just giving the power to the states instead of other businesses.  

Not sure if this is right...

   6. Why didn’t the Interstate Commerce Act immediately limit the power of the railroads? 
The law took along time to become legal.  The law was also resisted by the R.R.  The supreme court also said that they could not set a maximum R.R. rate.  When Roosevelt was president did the ICC gain the power to be effective.

Big Business and Labor

Read pages 447 – 450 (this is the first half of the chapter section, "Big Business & Labor - 14-3") and then answer the questions below about government’s attempts to regulate big business.

A. What is it?                    B.  How did it help businesses such as the Carnegie Company and tycoons like Andrew Carnegie?

1. Vertical integration

A.  When someone buys all of the natural resources and transportation so that they could controle most of all of the business (steel).  Like 1/3 of everything, resources, manufacturing, and distribution.
B.  He bought out all of his suppliers and could now controle all of the raw materials and transport systems.

2. Horizontal integration
A.  This is when one person tries to buy all of their competition.  Getting rid of their other competitors.  
B.   He also bought the other companies trying to sell their steel and merged them together.  Carnegie now controlled almost all of the steel industry.

3. Social Darwinism
A.  Social darwinism is basically the evolution of society.  This is how some people justified Laisse Faire.  They thought that business should be governed by natural law and no one had the right to intervene.  
B.  The Carnegie company must have flourished because of this.  The government would not stop them from taking over the steel industry and raking in all the cash.  This is how a lot of business had gotten very powerful and there was no room for other competition. 

4. Monopoly
A. When one company takes controle of the competition, so that the only place to get the product is from the company that took over all of the other companies.
B.  Andrew Carnegie had decided to buy all of his other competition.  This is a monopoly.  He got rid of everyone else so that people could only buy from him.  He did this by buying  out all of his competitors stocks.  

5. Holding company
A.  A form of monopoly.  A corporation that only bought the stocks of other companies.  
B.  J. P. Morgan was one of the most successful holding companies.  He became the worlds largest business when he bought the Cardigan Steel industry.

6. Trust
A.  A trust is when businesses join together and turn their stock over to a group of trustees.  Because of this sharing, the companies were allowed to divide the profits earned by the trust.   
B.  Rockefeller used this to gain total control of the oil industry...

7. The perception of tycoons as “robber barons”
C. How did it harm businesses such as Standard Oil and tycoons like John D. Rockefeller?
     People started seeing them as bad and steeling everyones money, but they also did great things like fund the Rockefeller Foundation and providing money to help in medical research.  

8. Sherman Antitrust Act
C. How did it harm businesses such as Standard Oil and tycoons like John D. Rockefeller?
     Businesses like the Standard Oil company weren't really that concerned about the Sherman Act.  If they thought that they might be caught, they would just split up into smaller groups...  The groups couldn't form trusts in other countries that interfered with trade, with other countries or the states. 

Expansion of Industry

After the Civil War, the United States was still a mostly rural nation. By the 1920s, it had become the leading industrial nation of the world. This immense change was caused by four major factors. Answer the questions for the first two factors.

Factor 1: Abundant Natural Resources
A. Which resources played crucial roles in industrialization?

     Black gold, which is also oil, and steel, which comes from iron without carbon in it.

B. How did Edwin L. Drake help industry to acquire larger quantities of oil?

     He used a steam engine to drill oil out of the ground.  This was the start of the oil boom and started in Kentucky.

C. How did the Bessemer process allow better use of iron ore?

     In the Bessemer process,  Iron ore was melted down and then air was injected into it.  This process released carbon and other impurities and the iron then became steel.

D. What new uses for steel were developed at this time?      The Bessemer process became improved and they came up with a new way to create steel.  This new process, the open-hearth process, also made it posible to create steel form scrap metal and raw materials.  With all of this steel, the railroads could be finished.  They could also make bridges and taller buildings because steel did not corrode like iron and could support large structures like sky scrapers.  

Factor 2: Increasing number of Inventions
A. How did Thomas Alva Edison contribute to this development? 

     Thomas E. had invented a light source that didn't just go out at night.  The lightbulb had created a whole new way on when people went to work.  He had harnessed the power of electricity and had perfected the lightbulb.    

B. How did George Westinghouse contribute to it? 

     George W.  had made the use of electricity safer for everyone and also less expensive.  Working with Thomas E. they made it easy to use electricity anywhere.   

C. How did Christopher Sholes contribute? 

     Christopher S. had created the first typewriter!  

Thats almost like creating the first computer....

D. How did Alexandar Graham Bell contribute? 

     He had created the telephone, which greatly impacted the whole world.  Both the typewriter and the telephone had totally changed the way people worked.  Women now had more job opportunities.  

Now people would start talking less to each-other in person and start texting more~

Factor 3: Expanding Urban Populations Provided new markets for inventions and industrial goods; and provided a ready supply of labor for industry
     ...
Factor 4: Government Support of Rapid Industrialization

     ...

Are we suposed to wright anything for these?

Tarbell's History of Standard Oil

1. How did Rockefeller set out to acquire control of the oil industry?
     He eliminated all of the competition, and controlled all production and sales in the U.S.  He created a monopoly.
2. Do you think Rockefeller deserved to be called a "robber baron?" Why or why not?
     He did deserve to be called a robber baron.  He created a monopoly on the oil and he could controle all of the oil and sales.  He could control the price of oil and make a tremendous profit.  He was robbing people of their money because he was the only person to sell oil and he was super rich, like a baron.