The American Yawp Chapter 16

Great Railroad Strike of 1877

Railroad financial bubble burst, strikes from Baltimore to St. Louis, Union roots

Scientific Management

the intro of industrialism, assembly lines, mass production

Cyrus McCormick

utilized mass production and production managers with his reapers and saw increases in profit

"Visible Hand"

a new class of managers between worlds of workers and owners

J.P. Morgan

Steele tycoon, oversaw the formation of the USS from 8 different companies (first monopoly)

Henry George

economist and author of 1879's "Progress and Poverty"

"robber baron"

nickname for financial titans like Rockefeller, Carnegie, Morgan, and Vanderbilt

Cornelius Vanderbilt

an American business magnate and philanthropist who built his wealth in railroads and shipping

John D. Rockefeller

an American oil industry business magnate, industrialist, and philanthropist

Andrew Carnegie

led the expansion of the American steel industry in the late 19th century

Social Darwinism

The Idea that the fittest would see superiority through economic success while welfare and charity would lead to social degeneration, or the survival of the weak

William Graham Sumner

believed the weak should not be helped to improve

Knights of Labor

Union that welcomed skilled and unskilled men and women workers in to its ranks

Haymarket Riot

a union protest in which a bomb exploded and killed seven policemen

American Federation of Labor

emerged after the Haymarket Riot as a more conservative option to the Knight of Labor

Homestead Strike (1892)

workers shut down and occupied on of Carnagie's steel mills

Pullman Strike (1894)

workers went on strike when wages were cut but the cost of living remained the same

Eugene Victor Debs

an American union leader, one of the founding members of the Industrial Workers of the World, and five times the candidate of the Socialist Party of America for President of the United States

Farmer's Alliance

a group of agricultural Farmer's Alliance dissatisfied with the impersonal capitalist system

Populist Party

sprang from the Farmer's Alliance as a third party option

Omaha Platform (1892)

expansion of federal power, nationalized railroad and telegraph systems, and government loans

Panic of 1893

sparked the worst economic depression the nation had seen to that point

Free Silver

a promotion of the free coinage of silver, a deviation of the gold standard

William Jennings Bryan

received the 1896 democratic presidential bid and the populist bid

William McKinley

won the presidential election of 1896 and installed the gold standard in law

Socialist Party of America

gained 150,000 members by 1913 making itself fairly influential in American society