The Changing American Population (1800-1860)

 Reasons:
 Booming agricultural economy of the west
▪ Cities became centers of trade (p. 263 shows examples)
 Improvements in public health
▪ Birth rate was lower
▪ Death rate was far lower, allowing for population increase
 Immigration
▪ Growth of cities was dramatic between 1840-1860
▪ Most immigrants from Germany & Ireland
▪ P. 263 shows city growth examples

 A defense of native-born people and a hostility
to foreign-born
 Also a desire to slow immigration
 Examples:
 Nativists would say that new immigrants were inferior
to older Americans
 Saw them as about the same as Native Americans
 They would say that immigrants were socially unfit
 Some said immigrants stole jobs from workforce &
lowered wages

 Native American Party: 1837
 Anti-immigration group
 Held their own convention in 1845
 Know-Nothings: 1845-1850
 First called “Supreme Order of the Star-Spangled
Banner”
 Banned Catholics from holding public office,
restrictive naturalization laws, literacy tests for
voting among their demands

 Know-Nothings led to American Party in 1852
in the west
 They actually won control of MA state gov’t
in 1854, won large number of seats in PA and
NY
 This was the peak of their power

Canal Age:
 1790-1820s=“turnpike era”
 By 1820s new means of transportation
 Steamboats, esp. Mississippi & Ohio Rivers
 Used commercially & for passengers
 By 1820s states turned to building canals
 Cheaper & quicker
 Erie Canal across NY (1817-1825)
 363 miles long, longest canal previously=28 miles
 Linked NYC to Chicago & Great Lakes

 Erie Canal’s success led to a canal building
boom (see map on p. 271)
 Connection between Lake Erie & Ohio River
 Led to increased settlement in Northwest
 Others failed in building successful canals

 Early Railroads:
 1804: inventors had been experimenting with
steam engines for land vehicles
 1820: first locomotive is run around a track (NJ)
 1825: first RR line opened in England
 First company: Baltimore and Ohio, 1830
▪ Peter Cooper & Tom Thumb (see picture on p. 272)
 By 1836, 1,000+ miles of track had been laid in 11
states

 Railroads:
 Were short
 Connected water routes
 No linkage of one RR company to another
 Track sizes (gauges) were not uniform
 Schedules did not match
 Constant wrecks!
 In competition w/ canals
 Slow improvements in 1830’s

 Triumph of RR:
 By 1860, there was almost 30,000 miles of track
 Most was in northeast but reached far and wide
 See map on page 273!!

Time to
travel from
New York to
various
locations
Maps from the
1932 Atlas of
the Historical
Geography of
the United
States

 Linkage of lines to make RR lines longer
 Lots of examples on page 272
 Lines would divert traffic from Erie Canal and
Mississippi River
 Chicago becomes the rail center of the West
 RR’s helped weaken the connection between
the Northwest and the South (dependency on
Mississippi River lessens)

 Several sources:
 Private American investors
 RR companies borrowed large sums of $$$
 Local governments, states, counties, cities, towns
 Federal gov’t
▪ Congressional grants to aid RR’s in 11 states by 1860
▪ 30 million + acres of land
▪ Rail companies earn huge profits & accumulate
enormous strength

 Telegraph:
 Samuel Morse, 1844
▪ 1st message, from Baltimore to Washington D.C.=“What
Hath God Wrought?”
 Transmitted from Baltimore to Washington, D.C.
 Low cost system of communication
 50,000 miles of wire connected by 1860 coast to
coast

More About Morse Code
More About Morse Code

 Steam cylinder rotary press
 Associated Press

 Things to consider: (p. 275)
 Retail distribution of goods changed
 Growth of corporations began here
▪ What is a corporation?
 Limited liability
▪ What does this mean?
 Credit was a way to borrow, but bank did not have
enough equity to support the borrowing
 Bank failures were frequent

 By far the biggest economic development of
the mid-19th century
 Started with textile industry, water-powered
 Shoe industry in MA
 Total value of manufactured goods rose from
almost $500 million in 1840 to $2 billion in
1860

 Over half of the “factories” were in the
northeast
 Those “factories” produced over 2/3 of the
nation’s manufactured goods
 Almost ¾ of the people working in
manufacturing were employed in N.E. and
Mid-Atlantic states

 American technology was admired by
Europeans
 Turret lathe, milling machine, precision grinding
machine, sewing machine—all lead to
interchangeability
 Interchangeable parts: Eli Whitney and Simeon
North
 Affected watches and clocks, locomotives, steam
engines, farm tools, bicycles, sewing machines,
typewriters, cash registers, automobile in upcoming
years

 Patents:
 Charles Goodyear: vulcanizing rubber
 Elias Howe: sewing machine, which Singer
improved

 Natural waterfalls could be channeled to
provide power for the mills
 Factories would close if water was frozen in
winter
 That is one reason factories looked for other
power: to be open year-round!

 Wood, Coal, Petroleum (later), Water
 Coal:
 Replacing wood and water power as fuel
 Mostly in PA, near Pittsburgh

The Changing American Population (1800-1860)

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