APUSH The American Pageant Chapter 13 Key Terms and People to Know

Vocabulary flashcards covering the key terms and significant figures of American economic and territorial growth from Chapter 13.

"Self-Reliance"

Ralph Waldo Emerson's 1841 essay that highlighted the popular American frontier ethos of extreme individualism and self-sufficiency.

rendezvous

The seasonal system used in the fur trade where mountain men, traders, and Native Americans met in the West to trade beaver pelts for manufactured goods.

ecological imperialism

The dramatic modification and exploitation of Western environments, ecosystems, and wildlife (such as near-extinction of beavers and bison) by Euro-American settlers.

Ancient Order of Hibernians

A semi-secret Irish Catholic fraternal society formed in Ireland and expanded to the U.S. to aid downtrodden Irish immigrants and combat anti-Irish prejudice.

Molly Maguires

A secret organization of Irish nineteenth-century miners who engaged in violent union activism in the Pennsylvania coal regions.

Tammany Hall

A powerful political machine in New York City that gained massive political support, particularly by offering services and aid to Irish immigrants in exchange for votes.

Know-Nothing party

An anti-immigrant and anti-Catholic political party (officially the American Party) formed in the 1840s and 1850s to limit immigration and naturalization.

Awful Disclosures

Maria Monk's sensationalist, anti-Catholic 1836 book containing fabricated accounts of alleged sins within a Catholic convent.

Industrial Revolution

The historical period of rapid transformation marked by the shift from hand-craftsmanship to factory-based mass production using machinery and steam/water power.

cotton gin

Eli Whitney’s 18793 invention that quickly separated seeds from short-staple cotton fiber, making cotton production immensely profitable and expanding slavery in the American South.

Patent Office

The federal bureau responsible for reviewing and granting patents for new inventions, which saw a massive surge in applications during the American industrial boom.

limited liability

A legal principle protecting individual investors, ensuring they cannot lose more than their actual financial investment in a corporation if it goes bankrupt.

Commonwealth v. Hunt

An 1842 Massachusetts Supreme Court landmark ruling establishing that labor unions were legal organizations, provided their methods were peaceful and honorable.

factory girls

Young, mostly single women employed in early New England textile mills (such as in Lowell, Massachusetts) working long hours in highly supervised environments.

cult of domesticity

The 19th-century cultural ideal that glorified a woman's traditional role inside the home as a moral center, wife, and mother.

McCormick reaper

Cyrus McCormick's mechanical horse-drawn machine that drastically sped up grain harvesting, transforming Western agriculture into commercial farming.

turnpike

A privately funded toll road built to move goods and people efficiently, named after the sharp turnpike spikes used to block passage until a fee was paid.

Erie Canal

A landmark New York waterway completed in 1825 connecting Lake Erie to the Hudson River, greatly lowering shipping costs and connecting the Midwest to Atlantic trade.

clipper ships

Sleek, fast American sailing ships of the mid-19th century designed for high-speed merchant trade across oceans.

Pony Express

A short-lived mail system established in 1860 that used relay riders on horseback to deliver mail fast across the Western territory from Missouri to California.

transportation revolution

The rapid expansion and improvement of internal transport routes—including turnpikes, steamboats, canals, and railroads—that linked American regional economies together.

market revolution

The fundamental economic change in 19th-century America from self-sufficient regional subsistence farming to a national network of commerce, industry, and mass commodity exchange.

Samuel Slater

The "Father of the American Industrial Revolution," an English mechanic who memorized British mill design and built the first U.S. textile mill in Rhode Island.

Eli Whitney

The American inventor who created the cotton gin and pioneered the concept of interchangeable parts for musket manufacturing.

Elias Howe

The inventor who patented the sewing machine in 1846, which revolutionized the garment industry.

Isaac Singer

The entrepreneur who refined Elias Howe's sewing machine and popularized its widespread commercial use and home adoption through aggressive marketing and installment plans.

Samuel F. B. Morse

The inventor of the electric telegraph and co-developer of Morse Code, revolutionizing long-distance communication.

John Deere

The inventor of the steel plow in 1837, which allowed farmers to break through the tough prairie soil of the American Midwest efficiently.

Cyrus McCormick

The inventor of the mechanical mower-reaper, which vastly increased agricultural productivity in grain farming.

Robert Fulton

The engineer who developed Clermont, the first commercially successful steamboat, in 1807, enabling two-way river navigation.

DeWitt Clinton

The New York Governor who championed and oversaw the construction of the Erie Canal ("Clinton's Big Ditch").

Cyrus Field

The American businessman who organized the laying of the first transatlantic telegraph cable across the Atlantic Ocean floor in 1858.

John Jacob Astor

A fur trader and real estate investor who became one of the wealthiest men in America through his American Fur Company.