Economic growth and development

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What were the population of people living of farms in 1865 and then 1890?
1865- 10 million 1890- 25 million
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What were farms like in 1865?
Small, household farms, but there was a steady increase in commercial agriculture
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What aided advances in agriculture?
Technology eg refrigeration and new machinery and the Development of Agriculture (carried out research and encouraged agricultural colleges)
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What limited agricultural?
Lack of contol over prices, reliance on bank finance and vulnerable to fluctuations in price (panic of 1873)
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What was the Panic of 1873?
Stock market prices collapsed, banks failed and led to years of depression
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What was agriculture like in the North and East?
Benefited from expanding markets eg 1880s- Chicago and Pittsburgh were hubs of a wide distribution network
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What role did railroads play in Northeast agriculture?
Transported goods at high freight rates
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What was agriculture like in the South?
Trapped in history with 'King Cotton' still ruling and generally lagged behind. Farmers were unable to buy or keep land and fell back into being tenant farmers. They struggled to access loans and were exploited by big businesses.
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What economic development was there in the 'New South'?
Railroad expansion, cotton, tobacco and sugar were major commodities.Trade and shipping expanded in ports like Mobile in Alabama.
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What was agriculture like in the west?
Large number of settlers battled to set up farms and cash crops
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When was the Union Pacific completed?
1869
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How did the West develop during this perios?
Carved into railroads, ranches, farms and mining towns
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What was the Oklahoma Land Rush 1889?
Congress granted 2 million acres of formerly Indian land as free land for homesteads.
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What encouraged rapid settlement in the West?
Prospect (eg Oklahoma Land rush), railroads, number of people and steel
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What is a key figure of rapid settlement?
Census 1860-760,000 settlers in western states 1890- over 6 million (while the native population halved)
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What role did steel play?
Vital in everyday life and agriculture eg steel ploughs broke through to rich soil, steel barbed wire, steel rails and steel barrels
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What difficulties did farmers face in the 1870s and 1880s?
Harsh climate (eg years of frought from 1887) , unproductive land, price fluctuation (eg boom in wheat in mid 1870s), reliance on loans, low investment and inefficient farming techniques
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What impact did the years of drought have?
Farmers went bankrupt and moved East
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What happened to agricultural prices over this period?
They fell mostly
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What factors accelerated urbanisation?
Industrialisation, mass immigration and improvements in transport
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What impact did urbanisation have?
New business opportunities for a vast workforce
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Which industries boomed during this period?
Coal, Iron, Copper and Oil
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What slowed the rapid expansion?
Panic of 1873
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What negative impact did the Panic of 1873 have?
5 year long recession in which firms went bankrupt
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What positive impact did the Panic of 1873 have?
Got rid of less efficient businesses and opened up opportunities for businessmen to buy failed companies
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How did the miles of railroad track compare in 1865 to 1893?
1865- 35,000 miles 1893- almost 200,000 miles
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When was the first transcontinental railroad completed and what was it called?
1869 and Union Pacific
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Why were railroads important?
Connected the country, carried goods, freight rates determined the future of many industries and dominated politics
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Who was the most powerful figure in railroads?
Cornelius Vanderbilt
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Why was the railroad boom chaotic?
Big companies swallowed smaller companies, fierce competition and monopolisation
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How did steel figures compare in 1875 to 1900?
1875- 360,000 tonnes 1900- 60 million tonnes
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What was the rate of growth for steel each year?
7%
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What major change encouraged further steel development?
Switching from old processes to the Bessemer process, which enabled mass production of high quality steel
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Why did steel production soar further in 1890?
Technical advances and the discovery of high grade iron ore in Lake Superior
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Who was the most powerful in steel production?
Andrew Carnegie
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How did he build his steel empire?
First steel works in Pennsylvania, brought other steel companies and consolidated into Carnegie Steel Company in 1892
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How did business organisation and size influence steel?
Western Pennslyvania became the hub for steel and many companies which began small like Bethlehem steel became large companies (eg Bethlehem steel became 2nd largest steel company in the US in 1903)
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Who dominated the oil industry?
John D Rockefeller
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Why was Cleveland, Ohio important?
Major centre for oil refining
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What did Rockefeller found and when?
Standard oil in 1870
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What was the Cleveland massacre?
Standard oil bought up 22 of its 26 competitors
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What percentage of world oil refining did Standard Oil do in the 1880s?
Around 85%
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What is joint-stock capitalism?
The development of larger economic units by business men who joined forces to form corporations
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What is the Bull Market?
When share prices were rising and business confidence was high, contrast bear market (falling prices and low confidence)
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What is cartelisation?
The process by which trusts and combinationsformed cartels able to dominate markets and squeeze competitors out of business
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What is the protective tariff?
Business persuading government to impose high tariffs on imports to make them more expensive and so 'protect' producers from cheap competition
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What is antitrust legislation?
Action demanded by those who wanted the government to regulate big business trusts to break up monopolies to enforce fair competition
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What did Samuel Insull set up?
Edison Electric Company
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What did the Edison Electric company become?
General Electric in 1892 (Giant monopoly)
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Other cards in this set

Card 2

Front

What were farms like in 1865?

Back

Small, household farms, but there was a steady increase in commercial agriculture

Card 3

Front

What aided advances in agriculture?

Back

Preview of the front of card 3

Card 4

Front

What limited agricultural?

Back

Preview of the front of card 4

Card 5

Front

What was the Panic of 1873?

Back

Preview of the front of card 5
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