| A | B |
|---|
| capitalism | economic system in which businesses are owned by private citizens or groups |
| robber baron | business leader who used dishonest methods to achieve wealth |
| corporation | business owned by investors who buy part of the company through shares of stock |
| John D. Rockefeller | robber baron who built fortune by controlling the oil industry |
| Andrew Carnegie | robber baron who built his fortune by controlling the steel industry |
| J.P. Morgan | robber baron who built his enormous fortune by controlling the banking, railroad, and eventually the steel industry |
| monopoly | no competition; when one person or company wipes out competition in order to control the market |
| trust | a type of monopoly; when several small companies join a larger company; the small companies turn over control in exchange for a share in the profit |
| pool | a type of monopoly; when several businesses agree to fix their prices thereby eliminating competition |
| philanthropist | a person who donates large amounts of money to charities |
| Gilded Age | term describing the Age of Big Business because on the surface there was a lot of wealth but there was a great deal of poverty below the surface |
| sweatshop | places where workers labored long hours for poor wages under unsafe and unhealthy conditions |
| Knights of Labor | a loose federation of workers from all different trades; allowed women and African Americans to join |
| socialism | an economic system where all members of a society are equal owners of all businesses; they share the work and the profits |
| Eugene V. Debs | leader of railroad workers union; led Pullman Strike of 1894 |
| Samuel Gompers | founder of American Federation of Labor |
| producer | a seller of goods or services |
| consumer | a buyer of goods or services |
| competition | when there are multiple producers to choose from |
| government regulation | laws passed to oversee business; usually to protect consumers and workers |
| labor unions | a group of workers who band together to seek better working conditions |
| Bessemer Steel Process | cheap, easy method of producing steel |
| Henry Bessemer | invented cheaper, easier method of producing steel |
| George Eastman | invented Kodak Camera |
| Alexander Graham Bell | invented telephone |
| Samuel F. B. Morse | invented telegraph and Morse Code |
| Morse Code | language of dots and dashes used by telegraph operators |
| Thomas Edison | invented hundreds of inventions including light bulb, phonograph, and electric power plant |
| Menlo Park | Edison's invention laboratory where thousands of inventions were made |
| patent | government document giving inventor the exclusive right to make or sell his/her invention |
| urbanization | the growth of cities |
| skyscrapers | buildings with many stories - built out of steel |
| electric elevator | invented by Otis; used in skyscrapers |
| trolley car | electric power street cars used in new cities |
| innovation | a new way of doing things |
| tenement | overcrowded, unsanitary, and unsafe apartments |
| slums | unsanitary, unsafe, and poverty-stricken neighborhoods |
| "Social Gospel" | . |
| Jane Addams | social worker who ran a settlement house in Chicago called the "Hull House" |
| Political Machines | . |
| Party Boss | the leader of a political machine |
| Boss Tweed | Party Boss of political machine in New York City - accused of embezelling millions of dollars |
| Old Immigrants | immigrants from Northern and Western Europe |
| New Immigrants | Immigrant from Southern Europe, Eastern Europe, Asia, and Latin America |
| push factors | what drives immigrants out of their homelands |
| pull factors | what attracts immigrants to US |
| Ellis Island | immigrant processing center in NYC; the first stop for most immigrants coming from Europe |
| Angel Island | immigrant processing center in San Francisco; the first stop for most immigrants coming from Asia |
| Emma Lazarus | poet who wrote "the New Colossus" ("give me your tired, your hungry, your poor...") |
| assimilation | the process of becoming American, of fitting in to mainstream culture |
| "melting pot" | the theory that all cultures blend together in the United States to form an "American culture" |
| "salad bowl" | the theory that individual ethnic cultures remain a distinct part of an overall "American culture" |
| ghetto | ethnic neighborhoods |
| Nativism | prejudice towards "foreigners" |
| Chinese Exclusion Act | law passed in 1880 in response to nativism; stated that Chinese immigrants would not be allowed to enter the US for the next 10 years |
| Quota System | . |
| Mass Culture | culture experienced by large numbers of people (all Americans) |
| literacy | the ability to read and write |
| consumer society | a society in which most people buy goods rather than making them |
| department stores | stores that sell a wide variety of consumer goods |
| leisure time | free time |
| Central Park | large public park in New York City designed to enable poor people to experience nature |
| Coney Island | amusement park opened to entertain the 'masses' of New York City |
| vaudeville | musical comedy theater for 'the masses' |
| Nickelodeon | early motion pictures which cost a nickel to view |
| Progressivism | a reform movement that developed around the turn of the century in response to the problems of industrialization and urbanization |
| The Progressive Era | 1900 - 1920 |
| reformers | people who work to improve conditions in society |
| muckrakers | Progressive journalists who wrote articles/stories exposing the problems of society |
| Jacob Riis | muckraker who photographed and wrote about the tenements of New York City |
| Upton Sinclair | muckraker who wrote about the abuses of the meat packing industry in his novel entitled "The Jungle" |
| Govermnment Regulation | laws passed by the government that serve as "rules of business" |
| Activist Government | a government that is heavily involved in regulating business and passing laws to protect citizens |
| Laissez Faire | "hands off"; a government which does not interfere with business |
| strict interpretation of the Constitution | leads to a weaker federal government that can not closely regulate businesses |
| loose interpretation of the Constitution | leads to a powerful federal government that can closely regulate businesses |
| Theodore Roosevelt | President from 1901-1909; known as "Progressive President" because of his support for progressive ideas like "trust-busting" and Conservation |
| "trust-busting" | using the power of the Federal government to break up monopolies |
| Women's Suffrage | the right of women to vote; the 19th Amendment of the US Constitution established women's suffrage |
| Conservation Movement | movement to protect the environment by "conserving" natural resources (forests, clean water, plant & animal life) |
| Pure Food and Drug Act | Federal law passed in 1906 which aimed at regulating the food and pharmaceutical industries |
| Sherman Anti-Trust Act | Federal law which made monopolies illegal |
| direct primary | voters from each party vote to choose who the party candidate will be for an upcoming election |
| initiative | enabled citizens to propose laws |
| referendum | allowed citizens to vote for or against laws already passed by state legislatures |
| recall | allowed citizensto vote to remove corrupt politicians from office |
| Secret Ballot | voters cast their votes in private so that noone will know who they voted for |
| Income Tax | a tax based on the amount of money a person makes |
| 16th Amendment | established a federal income tax |
| 17th Amendment | allowed citizens to choose Senators for the first time |
| Triangle ShirtWaist Factory | the site of a terrible factory fire in 1908 in which 146 female workers died - mainly because the conditions were very unsafe; led to many new Government regulations aimed at making factories safer |
