The Westward Movement, Industrialization, and the Market Revolution

Vocabulary flashcards covering the westward expansion, immigration trends, industrial advancements, early labor movements, and the transportation and market revolutions in nineteenth-century America.

"Rendezvous" system

A system in the Rocky Mountain area fur-trapping industry where trappers met each summer with traders from the East to exchange beaver pelts for manufactured goods.

George Caitlin

A painter and student of Native American life who was one of the first Americans to advocate the preservation of nature and proposed the idea of a national park.

"Black Forties"

The period during the 1840s when many Roman Catholic Irish immigrated to America due to a potato rot that caused widespread famine throughout Ireland.

German Forty-Eighters

Educated German immigrants who came to America between 1830 and 1860 following crop failures and the collapse of German democratic revolutions, moving largely to the Middle West (Wisconsin) and opposing slavery.

Nativists

Native-born Americans whose prejudices were inflamed by the massive immigration of Europeans, leading to opposition against immigrants and the rise of separate religious institutions.

Know-Nothing party (American party)

A political party created by native Americans who opposed immigrants and foreign influence in America.

Samuel Slater

Known as the "Father of the Factory System" in America; escaped Britain with memorized plans for textile machinery and put into operation the first machine to spin cotton thread in 1791.

Cotton gin

A machine built by Eli Whitney in 1793 that separated cotton seeds from cotton fiber far more effectively than human labor, reviving the demand for slavery and vastly expanding southern cotton production.

Tariff of 1816

A protective tariff passed by Congress to protect American manufacturers after British competitors flooded the market with low-priced goods following the Treaty of Ghent in 1815.

Interchangeable parts

A manufacturing principle introduced by Eli Whitney in 1798 using machines to produce identical, standardized musket components, becoming the basis for mass-production by 1850.

Elias Howe

The inventor who created the sewing machine in 1846, boosting northern industrialization and serving as the foundation of the ready-made clothing industry.

Limited Liability

A legal principle ensuring that an individual investor only risks their personal investment in a company in the event of a bankruptcy.

Laws of "free incorporation"

Statutes first passed in New York in 1848 that enabled businessmen to create corporations without applying for individual charters from the state legislature.

Samuel F. B. Morse

The inventor of the telegraph, which revolutionized long-distance communication.

Commonwealth vs. Hunt

A landmark Supreme Court case ruling that labor unions were not illegal conspiracies, provided their methods were honorable and peaceful.

Catharine Beecher

An activist and educator who urged women to enter the teaching profession.

Cult of Domesticity

A widespread cultural creed during the Industrial Revolution that glorified the customary functions of the homemaker within child-centered, affectionate families.

John Deere

The manufacturer who produced a steel plow in 1837 capable of breaking through the thick, tough soil of the American West.

McCormick Reaper

A horse-drawn mechanical reaper that cut and gathered crops significantly faster than hand-picking, enabling large-scale farming in the West.

Governor DeWitt Clinton

The Governor of New York who led the building of the Erie Canal, which connected the Great Lakes with the Hudson River in 1825.

Erie Canal

A New York canal completed in 1825 connecting the Great Lakes to the Hudson River, which lowered shipping prices and decreased transit times for passengers.

Clipper ships

Fast ships built in American naval yards during the 1840s and 1850s that sacrificed cargo room for speed to carry small amounts of goods rapidly, later superseded by improved steamboats.

Pony Express

A mail service established in 1860 to carry mail between St. Joseph, Missouri and Sacramento, California, which collapsed after 18 months due to a lack of profit.

Transportation Revolution

The rapid expansion of internal transit networks, driven by westward migration, that economically integrated the nation through canals, steamboats, and railroads.

Market Revolution

The economic transformation of the United States from a subsistence economy of self-sufficient households into a national commercial network of bought and sold goods.