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Robber Barons
"Robber baron" is a derogatory metaphor of social criticism originally applied to certain late 19th-century American businessmen who were accused of using unscrupulous methods to get rich -
Bessemer Steel Production
The Bessemer process was the first inexpensive industrial process for the mass production of steel from molten pig iron before the development of the open hearth furnace. The key principle is removal of impurities from the iron by oxidation with air being blown through the molten iron. -
The Gilded Age
The Gilded Age was an era of rapid economic growth, especially in the North and West. As American wages were much higher than those in Europe, especially for skilled workers, the period saw an influx of millions of European immigrants. -
Knights of Labor (Labor Union)
Knights of Labor (KOL), the first important national labour organization in the United States, founded in 1869. Named the Noble Order of the Knights of Labor by its first leader, Uriah Smith Stephens, it originated as a secret organization meant to protect its members from employer retaliations. -
Social Gospel
Christian faith practiced as a call not just to personal conversion but to social reform. Social Gospel. Social Gospel, religious social-reform movement prominent in the United States from about 1870 to 1920. -
Susan B. Anthony
Susan B. Anthony was an American social reformer and women's rights activist who played a pivotal role in the women's suffrage movement. Born into a Quaker family committed to social equality, she collected anti-slavery petitions at the age of 17. -
Alexander Graham Bell
Alexander Graham Bell was a Scottish-born scientist, inventor, engineer, and innovator who is credited with inventing and patenting the first practical telephone. He also founded the American Telephone and Telegraph Company in 1885. -
Tenement
A tenement is a multi-occupancy building of any sort. However, in the United States, it has come to refer most specifically to a run-down apartment building or to a slum. -
Samuel Gompers
Samuel Gompers is an English-born American labor union leader and a key figure in American labor history. Gompers founded the American Federation of Labor, -
American Federation of Labor (Labor Union)
The American Federation of Labor was a national federation of labor unions in the United States founded in Columbus, Ohio, in December 1886 by an alliance of craft unions disaffected from the Knights of Labor, a national labor union. -
Haymarket Riot
It began as a peaceful rally in support of workers striking for an eight-hour day and in reaction to the killing of several workers the previous day by the police. -
Interstate Commerce Act
The Interstate Commerce Act of 1887 is a United States federal law that was designed to regulate the railroad industry, particularly its monopolistic practices. The Act required that railroad rates be "reasonable and just," but did not empower the government to fix specific rates -
Theodore Roosevelt
Theodore Roosevelt Jr. was an American statesman and writer who served as the 26th President of the United States from 1901 to 1909. He also served as the 25th Vice President of the United States -
Settlement House
The settlement movement was a reformist social movement that began in the 1880s and peaked around the 1920s in England and the US. Its goal was to bring the rich and the poor of society together in both physical proximity and social interconnectedness. -
Jane Addams
Jane Addams, known as the "mother" of social work, was a pioneer American settlement activist/reformer, social worker, public philosopher, sociologist, public administrator, protestor, author, and leader in women's suffrage and world peace. -
Political Machines
A political machine is a political group in which an authoritative boss or small group commands the support of a corps of supporters and businesses, who receive rewards for their efforts -
Jacob Riis
Jacob Riis was a Danish-American social reformer, "muckraking" journalist and social documentary photographer. -
Populism and Progressivism
Populism - support for the concerns of ordinary people.
Progressivism - the term applied to a variety of responses to the economic and social problems rapid industrialization introduced to America. -
Sherman AntiTrust Act
The Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890 is a United States antitrust law passed by Congress under the presidency of Benjamin Harrison, which regulates competition among enterprises. -
Ida B. Wells
an African-American journalist, abolitionist and feminist who led an anti-lynching crusade in the United States in the 1890s. She went on to found and become integral in groups striving for African-American justice. -
Andrew Carnegie
Andrew Carnegie was a Scottish-American industrialist, business magnate, and philanthropist. Carnegie led the expansion of the American steel industry and is often identified as one of the richest people. He became a leading philanthropist in the United States and in the British Empire. -
Eugene v. Debbs
an American socialist, political activist, trade unionist, 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. -
William Jennings Bryan
William Jennings Bryan was an American orator and politician from Nebraska. Beginning in 1896, he emerged as a dominant force in the Democratic Party, standing three times as the party's nominee for President of the United States. -
Klondike Gold Rush
The Klondike Gold Rush was a migration by an estimated 100,000 prospectors to the Klondike region of the Yukon in north-western Canada between 1896 and 1899. -
Muckraker
A person who intentionally seeks out and publishes the misdeeds, such as criminal acts or corruption, of a public individual for profit or gain. Sometimes this information is linked to powerful businessmen. Muckraker is often applied specifically to journalists. -
Pure Food and Drug Act
The Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906 was the first of a series of significant consumer protection laws which was enacted by Congress in the 20th century and led to the creation of the Food and Drug Administration. -
Federal Reserve Act
The Federal Reserve Act is an Act of Congress that created and established the Federal Reserve System, and which created the authority to issue Federal Reserve Notes as legal tender. The Act was signed into law by President Woodrow Wilson -
Dollar Diplomacy
ollar diplomacy of the United States—particularly during President William Howard Taft's term— was a form of American foreign policy to further its aims in Latin America and East Asia through use of its economic power by guaranteeing loans made to foreign countries. -
Initiative, Referendum, Recall
They are three powers reserved to enable the voters, by petition, to propose or repeal legislation or to remove an elected official from office. -
Industrialization
This is the development of industries in a country or region on a wide scale. -
18th Amendment
The Eighteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution effectively established the prohibition of intoxicating liquors in the United States by declaring the production, transport, and sale of intoxicating liquors illegal. -
Team Pot Dome Scandal
The "Teapot Dome Scandal" was a bribery scandal involving the administration of United States President Warren G. Harding from 1921–1923 -
16th Amendment
The Sixteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution allows the Congress to levy an income tax without apportioning it among the states or basing it on the United States Census. -
Nativism
Nativism is the political policy of promoting the interests of native inhabitants against those of immigrants. However, this is currently more commonly described as an immigration restriction position. -
19th Amendment
The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex. -
Clarence Darrow
Clarence Seward Darrow was an American lawyer, a leading member of the American Civil Liberties Union, and a prominent advocate for Georgist economic reform. -
Upton Sinclair
Upton Beall Sinclair Jr. was an American writer who wrote nearly 100 books and other works in several genres. Sinclair's work was well known and popular in the first half of the 20th century, and he won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1943. -
17th Amendment
he Seventeenth Amendment to the United States Constitution established the popular election of United States Senators by the people of the states. The amendment supersedes Article I, §3, Clauses 1 and 2 of the Constitution, under which senators were elected by state legislatures.
