The Gilded Age through the Roaring Twenties

• With the end of the Civil War, the nation's industrial power in the north was turned to private use.
• In the mid-eighteenth century, railroads were rapidly expanding throughout the United States, which allowed people and goods to be moved farther and faster than they could be before.  
• New and powerful business tycoons dominated their respective industries—Rockefeller in oil, Carnegie with steel, and Morgan in finance. 
• In the period after the Civil War up until the 1900s, the Republican Party dominated the presidency and control of Congress. 
• Congress held the bulk of power during the period due to corruption, political weakness, and claims of illegitimacy faced by the Republican presidents of the period.
• J.P. Morgan was a powerful banker who controlled a number of industries.
• The Pullman Car Company produced sleeper cars and dining cars to make travel more comfortable.
• After the Civil War, George Westinghouse invented the air brake, and trains could stop more reliably as a result. Railroad firms agreed on a standard width between tracks to reduce transfers.
• For each mile of track laid by the Central and Union Pacific Railroads, the companies received 640 acres of public land.
• The “Golden Spike" celebrated the creation of the transcontinental railroad, Utah on May 10, 1869.
• Finally, in 1887, Congress responded to public outcry by creating the Interstate Commerce Commission, the first federal regulatory agency, to watch over the railroads. Its rules were not enforced, so it was ineffective until the early twentieth century.
• William A. Clark, who started his career as a school teacher and quartz miner, to become fabulously wealthy, owning copper mines.
• Social Darwinism applied the new theories of biological evolution, to society and wealth.
• Andrew Carnegie coined in his essay, “The Gospel of Wealth,” which posited the idea that dying rich was disgraceful, and that the wealthy had a moral duty to give away their riches
• Algerism followed the fiction of Horatio Alger, whose works of poor boys who got rich, glorified hard work as a means to the top of the pyramid.
• Social Darwinists believed that the humans who were the most fit became the most successful. Whatever people had the necessary skills to prosper would be the ones who rose to the top.
• The American presidents who resided in the White House from the end of the Civil War until the 1890s are called “the forgettable presidents.” 
• Vice President Chester Arthur signed into law the Pendleton Civil Service Reform Act. This opened many jobs to competitive exam rather than political connections, and the Republicans disowned him for it.
• Men and women were laid off without receiving retirement benefits or health insurance after working until their bodies could no longer sustain it.
• Employers struck back by forcing workers to sign agreements not to join a union, yellow-dog contracts, and hiring strikebreakers.
• Originally unions formed along occupational lines, but in 1866 a mass union known as the National Labor Union (NLU) was formed. 
• In 1886, the American Federation of Labor formed a different kind of large union that focused on skilled workers rather than the entire working class as a whole.
• The wealth disparity in America and the union struggle led to the growth of a relatively small socialist movement in the late 1800s and early 1900s.
• Marxism, a new theory of “scientific socialism” formulated by Karl Marx, a German working mainly in London.
• Eugene Debs was imprisoned for being a threat to the established order and making speeches against American involvement in World War I.
• In 1869, Uriah Stephens started the secret society known as the Knights of Labor, which believed class was more important than gender and race.
• Modern technologies (for the time) attracted more people and helped define city life. 
• Electricity, telephones, and subways all added to the allure of city life compared to country life.
• Immigrants arriving in the late 1800s and early 1900s included people from Eastern and Southern Europe. 
• Corruption was a common feature in city politics. 
• The power of big business, the rapid growth of cities, and the influx of people from many different cultures created a free-wheeling city political culture where favors could be bought from government officials.
• The critical invention leading to taller buildings was, the elevator, developed by Elisha Otis in 1861.
• Lightbulbs were developed by Thomas Edison in 1879, urban areas consumed them quickly
• Alexander Graham Bell added a new dimension to communications with his telephone in 1876.
•  Chicago architect Louis Sullivan was the foremost designer of the modern skyscraper. His designing motto was “form follows function,” making appearance secondary.
• Winslow Homer was the most famous painter during the postwar American era whose work often graced the covers of Harper’s Weekly magazine.
• Mass spectator sports became popular in the late 1800s, with Baseball establishing itself as the most popular one.
• Women entered public life by engaging in social work to help new immigrants into the nation and by becoming involved in the temperance movement.
• Newspapers have been transformed into a more modern form by dividing into sections based on readers' interests. 
• Newspaper owners pressured their authors to create more interesting content in order to increase their sales, which was known as "sensationalism".