CHP: 25 America Moves to the City 1865-1900

These flashcards cover key vocabulary related to the themes of urbanization, immigration, culture, and social reform in America between 1865 and 1900.

Urbanization

The process of cities expanding and people moving from rural areas to urban areas.

Gilded Age

A period of rapid economic growth and social change in the United States during the late 19th century.

Immigration

The action of coming to live in a foreign country, which significantly increased during the late 19th century.

Skyscrapers

Tall, multi-story buildings that began to define American city skylines during urban expansion.

New Immigrants

Immigrants from Southern and Eastern Europe and Asia, who arrived in large numbers in the late 19th century.

Tenements

Poorly constructed, overcrowded apartment buildings typically inhabited by immigrants in urban areas.

Assimilation

The process by which individuals from different cultures may adopt the customs and attitudes of the prevailing culture.

Muckrakers

Investigative journalists in the early 20th century who exposed social ills and corruption in urban life.

Tammany Hall

The infamous political machine in New York City associated with corruption and political patronage.

Women's Christian Temperance Union

A group founded in the 19th century that advocated for temperance and other social reforms.

Jacob Riis

A photographer and muckraker who documented the poor living conditions in New York City tenements in his book 'How the Other Half Lives'.

Settlement Houses

Community centers established in urban neighborhoods to provide educational and social services to immigrants and the poor during the late $19th$ century.

Jane Addams

The co-founder of Hull House in Chicago and a prominent leader in the settlement house movement aimed at social reform.

Political Machine

A political organization that controls a city or state through patronage and providing services in exchange for votes.

Boss Tweed

William M. Tweed, the head of Tammany Hall, New York City's powerful political machine, known for widespread corruption and graft.

Nativism

A social attitude involving hostility toward immigrants and a preference for native-born citizens.

Chinese Exclusion Act

An $1882$ law that banned the immigration of Chinese laborers, representing the first major US restriction on immigration based on nationality.

Social Gospel

A movement that encouraged Christians to improve social conditions for the urban poor as part of their religious duty.

Industrialization

The period of rapid economic and social change that transformed the United States from an agrarian to an industrial society.

Ellis Island

An immigration inspection station in New York Harbor that served as the primary processing center for millions of European immigrants arriving after $1892$.

Angel Island

The immigration station on the West Coast, located in San Francisco Bay, where mainly Asian immigrants were processed.

Social Darwinism

A theory used during the Gilded Age to justify the accumulation of wealth by stating that only the 'fittest' survive in business and society.

Pendleton Civil Service Act

An $1883$ federal law that stipulated that government jobs should be awarded on the basis of merit rather than political affiliation.

Sherman Antitrust Act

A federal law passed in $1890$ that committed the American government to opposing monopolies by prohibiting contracts or combinations in restraint of trade.

Thomas Nast

A famous political cartoonist whose work was instrumental in exposing the corruption of Boss Tweed and Tammany Hall.

Bessemer Process

A cheap and efficient process for making steel, developed around $1850$, which enabled the growth of railroads and skyscrapers.

Upton Sinclair

A muckraker who shocked the nation with 'The Jungle', a novel that revealed the gruesome details of the meatpacking industry.

Meat Inspection Act

A law passed in $1906$ that established strict cleanliness requirements for meatpackers and created a federal meat inspection program.

Lincoln Steffens

A leading muckraker who exposed business and government corruption in his book 'The Shame of the Cities'.

Mass Transit

Transportation systems, such as subways and electric streetcars, designed to move large numbers of people along fixed routes efficiently.

The Melting Pot

A term used to describe a mixture of people from different cultures and races who blend together by abandoning their native languages and customs.