Technological change

Transportation and shipping

The development of a transcontinental railroad network physically connected the United States, providing enormous benefits for passengers as well as for farmers, industrialists, and merchants shipping merchandise across the country. Improvements in steamships and ironclad vessels also improved transportation for passengers and for freight. While it would take until 1914 for the Panama Canal to finally open, the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869 spurred greater interest in canal and port building in the United States and globally.

The first electric streetcars in the United States debuted in New York City and Chicago in the 1870s, improving urban transportation and paving the way for later innovations, including subway systems. While not mass produced until the early 20th century, the first automobiles debuted in the 1880s, presaging enormous changes in the United States and globally throughout the 20th century. The development of refrigerated railroad cars allowed for shipping food products, including beef, over much greater distances.

Communications and photography

Communications technology experienced several significant breakthroughs in the 19th century. In the 1840s, Samuel Morse’s improved **telegraph **dramatically improved the speed of communications in major cities in the eastern United States, but it would be in the post-Civil War years that telegraph lines would connect much of the country. In 1876, Alexander Graham Bell achieved another critical breakthrough when he developed a successful telephone.

While photography had developed throughout much of the 19th century, significant advances in the later years of the century included George Eastman’s Kodak film and mass production of affordable cameras. The development of electric typewriters, the phonograph and motion picture projectors spurred greater productivity in publishing and entertainment.

Energy

Thomas Edison successfully harnessed electricity, permanently transforming American cities and landscapes, including through the construction of the first American power plant in 1882. Oil became an increasingly important fuel and energy source, powering factories and equipment and propelling John D. Rockefeller’s Standard Oil Company to become an incredibly powerful monopoly.

Industry

In the steel industry, Andrew Carnegie imported the Bessemer process for removing impurities from steel; over the next 20 years, with improved technology and processes, the price of producing steel fell by 90%. Carnegie also used horizontal and vertical integration strategies to improve profitability and drive out competitors. These advances in steel production led to the development of the first steel-framed skyscrapers in American cities.

Later in life, Carnegie would become associated with the gospel of wealth idea that successful businesspeople and other wealthy people needed to assist those who were less fortunate; an enduring legacy of Carnegie’s philanthropy is the nationwide network of Carnegie libraries still found in many towns across the United States today.

Andrew Carnegie, The Gospel of Wealth, June 1889

This, then, is held to be the duty of the man of Wealth: First, to set an example of modest, unostentatious living, shunning display or extravagance; to provide moderately for the legitimate wants of those dependent upon him; and after doing so to consider all surplus revenues which come to him simply as trust funds, which he is called upon to administer, and strictly bound as a matter of duty to administer in the manner which, in his judgment, is best calculated to produce the most beneficial results for the community—the man of wealth thus becoming the mere agent and trustee for his poorer brethren, bringing to their service his superior wisdom, experience, and ability to administer, doing for them better than they would or could do for themselves.

Agriculture

Developments of larger and more powerful plows, harvesters and tractors improved agricultural yields, although the stripping of critical layers of topsoil eventually culminated in the Dust Bowl in the early 20th century. Increasing mechanization of agriculture, particularly on the plains, was a critical factor in the creation of the Grange political movement that sought to regulate the railroad industry and ensure that small farms were not forced into bankruptcy and/or wiped out.

During the last third of the 19th century, technological change transformed American lives and landscapes.

Cities grew, both outward and upward, through the development of expanded and improved transportation networks as well as the building of skyscrapers.

American industrial and agricultural output soared as manufacturers and farmers integrated powerful new machines and energy sources.

Financial innovations, including the establishment of the Dow Jones stock index, provided needed capital for these technological advances.