Title: U.S. History, The Growing Pains of Urbanization, 1870-1900, Urbanization and Its Challenges | OER Commons
Headings: 
Subject:
Material Type:
Level:
Provider:
Tags:
Urbanization and Its Challenges
Overview
THE KEYS TO SUCCESSFUL URBANIZATION
Electric Lighting
Communications Improvements
Intracity Transportation
The Rise of Skyscrapers
Jacob Riis and the Window into “How the Other Half Lives”
THE IMMEDIATE CHALLENGES OF URBAN LIFE
Jane Addams Reflects on the Settlement House Movement
Section Summary

Content: These factories encouraged more and more people to move to urban areas where jobs were plentiful, but hourly wages were often low and the work was routine and grindingly monotonous. As these panels illustrate, the population of the United States grew rapidly in the late 1800s (a). Much of this new growth took place in urban areas (defined by the census as twenty-five hundred people or more), and this urban population, particularly that of major cities (b), dealt with challenges and opportunities that were unknown in previous generations. Eventually, cities developed their own unique characters based on the core industry that spurred their growth. In Pittsburgh, it was steel; in Chicago, it was meat packing; in New York, the garment and financial industries dominated; and Detroit, by the mid-twentieth century, was defined by the automobiles it built. But all cities at this time, regardless of their industry, suffered from the universal problems that rapid expansion brought with it, including concerns over housing and living conditions, transportation, and communication. These issues were almost always rooted in deep class inequalities, shaped by racial divisions, religious differences, and ethnic strife, and distorted by corrupt local politics.