City Life Notes

• any people leaving farms for the cities in this time period?

  Farm equipment got better, meaning less demand for manual labor
• Why were African Americans moving to the cities?

  Reconstruction Era
• Why were there so many more job opportunities in the cities?

  Factories were producing more, demand for factory jobs increasd
• What were the buildings called where people in the cities often lived?

  Tenement buildings
• What were some hazards associated with them?

  Tiny, cramped, no ventilations (disease), fire hazard, high infant mortality, no adequate heat, no running water
• How did new laws in NYC improve things?

  1879 NYC law said that all apartments needed at least 1 outdoor window
• How did architects change the design of buildings?

  Dumbbell apartments allowed for outdoor windows while maximizing space but this only slightly improved conditions
• Who was Jacob Riis?

  Reporter who took photographs and wrote of ill conditions in tenements and other parts of the city. He wrote and published "How the Other Half Lives," which exposed the horrible living conditions
• How were cities divided at this time?

  Into wards
• What was the role of a ward boss?

  Bosses got votes, hand out favors--could be city jobs, government contracts, or grocery money for a widowed neighbor
• What was the role of a city boss?

  Ran city, ward bosses reported to them, city boss handpicked candidates for office
• What party dominated politics in the cities?

  East Coast cities dominated by Democratic party
• Who was Boss Tweed?

  William Tweed--head of Tammany Hall of NYC
• What is Tammany Hall?

  Political headquarters of the city
• How did Tweed make millions of dollars?

  Padded bills for government contracts and kept the extra cash
• How did Tweed make millions of dollars?

  By Thomas Nast, a cartoonist, who depicted Tweed as a thief
• What happened to Tweed?


  He was convicted in 1873