1865-1911 Timeline1865-1911 Timeline

The Industrial Age / The Industrial Age /

The Gilded AgeThe Gilded Age

By Matthew Shimshock

Each Chapter is Color CodedEach Chapter is Color Coded

Chapter 13 – Green

Chapter 14 - Blue

Chapter 15 - Yellow

Chapter 16 - Red

The transcontinental railroad is connected at Promontory, Utah when the Central Pacific and the Union Pacific meet.

The Homestead Act offers 160 acres of land free to any citizens or intended citizens who were the head of house hold.

The Tweed Ring is formed as New York City’s most powerful democratic political machine. It is led by Boss Tweed. These corrupt politicians stole money from tax payers and are possibly the most corrupt politicians in American history. The Tweed Ring took advantage of the numerous opportunities for graft, the illegal use of political influence for personal and political gain. They also used “kick backs” which were illegal payments for their services, this enriched the political machine and individual political bosses.

Jacob Riis leaves his native home of Denmark and becomes a police photographer . He took some of the best photos and used them to expose the hardships of the New York slums. He took pictures of mainly Tenements which were overcrowded and unsanitary multifamily urban dwellings.

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1862 187018695/10/1869

Mark Twain, one of the most famous authors of the time, writes the book “The Gilded Age” which is said to describe the time and era. The characters of this book tryed to get rich quick but find it harder then they anticipated.

John D. Rockefeller’s Standard Oil Company processed 2 - 3 percent of the country’s crude oil. Within a decade they controlled 90%. This is almost considered to be a monopoly (the complete control over it’s industry’s production wages and prices.)

George A. Custer reported that the Black Hills had gold. The Sioux and the Cheyenne had a sun dance and saw Indians and soldiers falling from their horses. They met Custer and his cavalry at the Little Bighorn river and crushed Custer’s troops.

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Thomas Alva Edison became a pioneer on the new industrial frontier when he established the world’s first research laboratory in Menlo Park, New Jersey. There Edison perfected the light bulb. George Westinghouse along with Edison added innovations that made electricity safer and less expensive.

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1870 18761874 June 1869

Nez Pearce War occurred in 1887. These battles were fought by the Indians to try and get their native lands back from the U.S government.

Alexander Graham Bell unveiled a very important invention of this century, the telephone. The telephone made communication easier and more efficient.

Chief Joseph was one of the leaders of the Nez Pearce War. He led his troops along with Sitting Bull to try and find political asylum in the “war” against the federal government. He fought in the Nez Pearce war where he formally surrendered.

Buffalo Soldiers were black soldiers that formed the 9th and 10th Calvary. They also fought the 24th and 25th infantry regiments. These soldiers fought in the American Indian wars.

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1876 1877Jun – Oct 1869

American manufacturers were using the Bessemer process to produce 90 percent of the nation’s steel. This process involved injecting air into molten iron to remove carbon and other impurities.

The Vanderbilt family owned railroad systems in western North Carolina. They were one of the many prominent millionaire families in the era.

Ragtime originated in this time period. It Is a mix between African American spirituals and European musical forms. Ragtime led later to jazz, rhythm and blues, and rock ‘n’ roll.

George Pullman built a company that manufactures sleeper carts. He owned a town that is almost a utopian society. Pullman had a tightly controlled environment for his workers. However Pullman refused to give his workers better wages and they went on a violent strike in 1894 also know as the Pullman strikes.

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1880

Joseph Pulitzer, a Hungarian immigrant bought the New York World newspaper. This was a popular innovation that emphasized “sin, sex, and sensation”. His main competitor, William Hearst owned the San Francisco Examiner. He sought to outdo his other paper, the New York Journal, by filling it with exaggerated tales.

The Mugwumps form. These are political activists. They were republicans who decided to vote for the Democratic candidates because they knew that James G. Blain was politically corrupt.

Haymarket Affair was one of the most violent strikes in this time period. One of the rioters tossed a bomb into a crowd of police. Seven police officers died as well as several workers.

Dumbell Tenements are made in New York City. These tenements were used to help immigrants that were coming from all of the world and came through an immigration station called Ellis island. There was also another on the west coast called Angel island. Both were meant to help immigrants adjust to the culture shock of the U.S. During this time period America was known as a Melting Pot because this seemed to be the place where people from all nations lived and spoke the same language. Because of many immigrants the idea of nativism came about or favoritism of native-born Americans.

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Booker T. Washington believed that racism would end once blacks acquired useful labor skills and proved economic value. He founded the Tuskegee Normal and Industrial Institute to help African Americans acquire useful skills.

1881 18861884 5/4/1869

1883

Jane Addams founds the Chicago's Hull house. This building was a settlement house and was found in a slum neighborhood that provided assistance to people in the area, especially immigrants. These buildings came about because of urbanization or growth of cities.

Sweat shops are very popular around this time. These workshops were in tenements rather than in factories. Workers had little choice but to put up with the conditions.

The Dawes Act is passed. It meant to “Americanize” the Indians and possibly lead to assimilation. This is the plan in which Native Americans give up way of life and become part of the white culture. The Dawes act breaks up Indian reservations and give some of the land back to individual Native Americans. Most of the Indians at this time lived on the Great Plains which was a huge amount of flat land full of wild buffalo.

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The National Colored Farmers Alliance is like its white counterpart the National Farmers Alliance. Both wanted to educate people on interest rates and government loans.

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George Eastman developed a series of more convenient cameras compared to heavy glass plated cameras. These new cameras used flexible film which could be sent immediately to a processing center.

1886 188918881887

The Sherman Antitrust Act is passed. This law was intended to prevent monopolies by making it illegal to establish trusts that interfered with free trade.

The Omaha Platform is the populist party convention in Omaha. They demanded reforms to be lifted to get rid of the burden of debt from farmers and other workers.

Ida B. Wells was a editor for a local paper. She helped fight against the evils of lynching and other forms of racism including the poll tax which is to be paid at the polls. Most blacks could not afford this tax. Another issue that many blacks had to deal with was the grandfather clause which stated that if your father or grandfather could vote before January 1st 1867 you could vote. This means that most blacks could not vote because many of them were still slaves. Most of these laws were called Jim Crow laws, which were laws meant to exploit the African American population.

Members of Custer's old regiment rounded up about 350 Sioux Indians and took them to a camp called Wounded Knee. The next day the soldiers demanded that the Indians give up all their guns. A shot was fired and the soldiers killed almost 300 unarmed Native Americans.

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1890 189212/28/1890

W.E.B Du Bois is the first African American to receive a doctorate from Harvard. He founded the Niagara Movement which insisted that blacks seek a liberal arts education.

William Jennings Bryan was the editor of the Omaha World Herald. He ran for the Democratic Nomination for President and was a firm Believer in the silver standard. He gave the Cross of Gold Speech which was in huge opposition of the gold standard.

Eugene V. Debs was a socialist who attempted to form an industrial union called the American Railway Union. They allowed unskilled workers and skilled workers alike into the Union. They also focused on Collective Bargaining, or negotiation between representatives of labor and management to reach agreements on working conditions.

In Plessy V. Ferguson, the supreme court ruled that the separation of races in public accommodations was legal and did not violate the Fourteenth Amendment.

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1894 18961895

About 10 million Americans shopped by mail ordered catalogs. This was a huge advancement because it was delivered to you no matter where you lived. Americans could order clothes or Merchandise.

Orville and Wilbur Wright, bicycle manufacturers from Dayton, Ohio, experiment with new engines powerful enough to have a craft heavier than air float aloft. On December 17th at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, they flew the first plane120 feet in the air for 12 seconds.

The Supreme Court ruled that debt peonage, a system that bound laborers into slavery in order to work off a debt to a employer, was illegal.

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1903 1911191012/17/1903