U.S. History: Reconstruction to World War I

Comprehensive vocabulary flashcards covering major concepts, historical figures, acts, and events from Reconstruction, the Gilded Age, the Progressive Era, and World War I.

Militarism

New military technologies, an arms race between countries, and the glorification of war.

The Balkans

A powder keg region in Europe where nationalism was very strong before World War I.

Immediate cause of World War I

The assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, leading Austria to declare war on Serbia, followed by all allies joining in.

Zimmerman telegraph

The communication that caused the U.S. Congress to declare war on Germany.

American home front during World War I

An era when thousands of Black Americans moved from the Jim Crow South to northern cities to work in factories, the National War Labor Board was created to eliminate strikes, and women and Black men were given jobs they had never been permitted.

Meatless Monday and wheatless Wednesday

Part of a nationwide campaign to support the war effort by saving food, going without certain foods, and growing fruits and veggies at home.

War Industry Board

An agency that coordinated the purchase of war supplies for the army and the navy.

Liberty bonds

Government securities bought by almost half of Americans to lend money to the government, bringing in two-thirds of the funds needed to fight.

Muckraker

An investigative reporter who rakes up the corruption and inequalities of society.

upton Sinclair

An investigative figure whose work exposed sanitary conditions in the meatpacking industry, leading to the Pure Food and Drug Act.

Square Deal

President Theodore Roosevelt's agenda focused on giving Americans a fair deal.

Booker T. Washington

The son of enslaved parents who believed Black Americans would eventually earn equality over time and advocated vocational training as the first step.

W. E. B. Du Bois

The first Black American to earn a PhD from Harvard, who helped establish the NAACP and disagreed with Washington's tolerance of separate but equal.

Panama Canal

A waterway that made trade and travel easier and faster between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans.

Spanish colonies

Guam, Puerto Rico, and The Philippines.

Yellow journalism

A style of reporting events that used sensational and sometimes false headlines.

USS Maine

A ship that exploded in the harbor of Havana, Cuba in February 1898, whose destruction was immediately blamed on Spain by yellow journalists.

"Remember the Maine"

A phrase that became the rallying cry of pro-Americans following the ship's destruction.

Imperilist

Competition for colonies and territory.

Drop in crop prices

A decline caused by new agricultural technology, greater crop yields, and better farming methods.

The Grange

An association of farmers organized to protect their rights and profits.

Populist Party

A political party formed to help farmers escape debt, give citizens a voice in government, increase the money supply, advocate an eight-hour workday, and support the direct election of U.S. senators.

The Gilded Age

A term used by Mark Twain to describe a period when severe social problems were masked by a thin layer of gold, making things appear better than they actually were.

Melting pot

The blending together of cultures in America resulting from high immigration numbers in the late nineteenth century.

Ellis Island

A processing center located in New York for incoming European immigrants.

Horizontal integration

A business strategy where a company expands by merging with or buying competing companies that make the same product.

Vertical integration

A business strategy where a single company owns or controls multiple stages of its supply chain.

Homestead Act

Legislation signed into law by Lincoln granting settlers up to 160 acres of land in the West, on the condition that they improve it and live on it for five years.

Chinese immigrants

An immigrant group that came to the United States specifically to work on the railroad.

Promontory Point

The location where the eastern and western sections of the Transcontinental Railroad met.

Monopoly

A business structure where one single company supplies all the products in a market.

laissez faire policy

An economic policy characterized by few government regulations on industry.

Robber barons

Industrialists who squashed competition, paid low wages, exploited their workforce, and used their influence to manipulate government policies.

Andrew Carnegie

A figure who gave away millions of dollars to the poor, schools, and other social programs.

Tenements

Housing units whose stated purpose was to provide single-family homes for working-class families.

Thirteenth Amendment

The constitutional amendment stating that neither slavery nor involuntary servitude shall exist within the U.S.

Fourteenth Amendment

The constitutional amendment establishing that all persons born or naturalized in the U.S. are citizens of the U.S.

Fifteenth Amendment

The constitutional amendment providing that the right of U.S. citizens to vote shall not be denied.

Freedmen's Bureau

An organization established to help formerly enslaved people obtain schooling, jobs, and housing.

Ku Klux Klan

A group of former Confederate soldiers who terrorized Black people across the South.

06/19/1865

The date when the Emancipation Proclamation was two years old, the Thirteenth Amendment had already been written, and Confederate armies had already been suspended.

Jim Crow

An era in which white supremacists took power across the South, racial segregation became the norm, and Southern states found ways to strip free Black Americans of rights.