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Bill Thorsell

Patrick Walsh
3/3/2008
US History
American Culture: Changes in the late 19th to early 20th century
From the end decades of the 19th century to the beginning decades of the 20th century,

American society undertook massive cultural change. During the civil war, the north had

an insatiable need for mass amounts of war supplies. The north naturally landed on the

only feasible way to meet their massive demand for goods: factories. These giant

factories created millions of jobs for the people of America. People of all different races,

genders and cultures swarmed into the city. “Between 1870 and 1920, American cities

flourished as never before. The urban population of the nation increased from under ten

to over fifty-four million people.”1 Through this combination of urbanization and

industrialization, American culture began to change. Changes such as the countries

change to consumerism, the reformation of old puritan ideals, new forms of

entertainment, transportation, the creation of a public mass culture, and gender anxiety all

emerged within this time. These changes occurred because of reasons like scientific

discoveries, a push towards secularism, mass production, immigration and the change

from blue collar to white collar jobs. Industrialization links all of these changes together

and plays a great part in the culture change at the turn of the century.

Industrialization brought upon many changes for traditional American values and

the societies that upheld them. "But a more fundamental transformation was occurring in

the social structure itself: the change in the motivations and rewards of the economic

system."2 The traditional Protestant ethic was a thing of the past. “Status and its badges,

1
David Nasaw, Going Out: The Rise and Fall of Public Amusements (New York: Basic Books, 1993), 1
2
Daniel Bell, The Cultural Contradictions of Capitalism, (New York: Basic Books, 1976), 115
not work and the election of God, became a mark of success.”3 The previous ethic is best

described using the term “delayed gratification”4. You would wait over your entire life,

working hard each day, for God’s approval and in turn you would be rewarded in heaven.

The new ethic emphasized working hard in order to gain money to buy material objects.

“A higher standard of living, not work as an end in itself, then became the engine of

change. The glorification of plenty, rather then the bending to niggardly nature, becomes

the justification of the system.”5 Money, which had always been considered a necessary

evil, was now the main focus of work. People who had money had power within society.

“American business was the dynamic agency tearing up small-town life and catapulting

America into world economic dominance; and it was doing so within the language and

cover of the protestant ethic”6 This change in puritan beliefs was a major cause of the

creation of the public mass culture that developed in the late 19th century.

Another thing that this change in puritan ideals caused was Americas switch into

a consumerist nation. After the civil war, America had all these factories that were no

longer being used to produce war supplies. These factories were now being put to use

producing goods that the general public needed. Previously customers just did not have

the money to buy luxury items, however, as wages increased, people began to have the

spare money to obtain a few items of extravagance. Because of the need for luxury items,

and the extra cash the people now had to spend on material possession because of the

change in protestant ideals, stores began to open. For the first time, store owners began

to make their shops something completely different. It was not good enough to just carry

3
Daniel Bell, The Cultural Contradictions of Capitalism, (New York: Basic Books, 1976), 115
4
Daniel Bell, The Cultural Contradictions of Capitalism, (New York: Basic Books, 1976), 115
5
Daniel Bell, The Cultural Contradictions of Capitalism, (New York: Basic Books, 1976), 115
6
Daniel Bell, The Cultural Contradictions of Capitalism, (New York: Basic Books, 1976), 116
the goods that people wanted. They tried to specialize in interior design, attempting to

make shopping and enjoyable experience. Anyone was a potential customer, and as the

store owner, you could not afford to provide any hindrance to him from coming in. and

you must do everything in your power to attract him to your store. “A step at the entrance

is a mistake…no hindrance should be offered to people who may drift into the store.”7

“The point was to give shopping space its own unique identity.”8 Store owners designed

elaborate displays in the windows and came up with colorful cloths to place on tables.

They picked a theme for the store and designed everything towards that one theme. One

man said, “People do not buy the thing, they buy the effect… Make the whole store a

brilliant showplace.”9 People like John Wannamaker and Franklin Woolworth made

millions off it. People began to shop for pleasure rather then for a purpose. Woolworth

came up with the idea for a 5 cent item bin to get people to spend money on a whim. This

introduced the concept of set prices, rather then bargaining. Unheard of at the time, this

revolutionized the way business was done. This all spawned because of the new

materialistic ideals of the time. However, none of this could have ever happened if it

were not for industrialization. Without industrialization, there would be no way to mass

produce these items that the stores were now opening to carry.

One of the main cultural changes of the late 19th and early 20th century was the

way people spent their time. Many new forms of entertainment were developed over this

time period, including athletic clubs, theaters and radio, But most importantly, the

invention of amusement parks. As the puritan work ethic changed, people found that they
7
William Leach, Land of Desire: Merchants, Power, and the Rise of a New American Culture (New York:
Vintage, 1993), 129
8
Daniel T. Rodgers, The Work Ethic in Industrial America, 1850-1920 (Chicago: University of Chicago
Press, 1978), 74
9
: William Leach, Land of Desire: Merchants, Power, and the Rise of a New American Culture (New
York: Vintage, 1993), 134
had more money, and worked less hours in a day. An easy way to wind down from a

stressful day at work was to visit an amusement park. While leisure time used to be a

thing for the excessively wealthy, it was now available to the average worker. “A

workingman wants something besides food and clothes in this country… he wants

recreation. Going out was more than an escape from the tedium of work, it was the

gateway into a privileged sphere of everyday life.”10 The average working man had a

chance to live out the live of an upper class citizen. “Going out”11, was not for everyone

however. Many people who worked manual labor jobs did not have the time to stay out

late and experience amusement parks or night clubs. When they got off work, they were

very tired and needed all the rest that they could get. “The city’s white collar workers

were the most avid consumers of the commercial pleasures. Their work was increasingly

regimented, concentrated, and tedious, creating a need for recreation.”12

While these leisurely activities were a great social advance, none of them would

have been possible without the scientific advancement of electricity. Electricity spawned

a whole new form of entertainment: the night life. This meant for the first time, after

work, under the new electric street lamps, people could go enjoy themselves safely as

night. Any city blazing with night lights was represented as one “worthy of respect”13.

Lights were used for much more than just lighting the cities, they also employed to bring

10
David Nasaw, Going Out: The Rise and Fall of Public Amusements (New York: Basic Books, 1993),
141
11
David Nasaw, Going Out: The Rise and Fall of Public Amusements (New York: Basic Books, 1993),
141
12
David Nasaw, Going Out: The Rise and Fall of Public Amusements (New York: Basic Books, 1993),
141
13
David Nasaw, Going Out: The Rise and Fall of Public Amusements (New York: Basic Books, 1993),
139
visitors to places of entertainment. Amusement parks, night clubs and radio were all

made possible by the invention of electricity.

At the same time that America was industrializing, men in America were being

pushed into an anxious frenzy over their masculinity. Men who had been working on

farms and in mines all their lives were now switching over to white collar jobs; managing

stores, overseeing production and other things of the same sort. Many cultural changes of

the time can be linked back to this anxiety. After industrialization and the switch to white

collar jobs, many new athletic clubs were formed. These clubs were places that all men

could get together and exercise and get back to their masculine roots. One of the most

popular writings of the time was spurred from this anxiety. Tarzan, the story of a baby

boy who was left in the jungle and raised by apes to eventually become king of the

jungle, was written in 1912. We learn within the story that Tarzan hunts a black man who

is hunting his ape family. This is a very masculine thing. After Tarzan kills the man, he

thinks about eating the meat. His instincts tell him this is wrong, although this is what is

done in the jungle. “All he knew was that he could not eat the flesh of this black man, and

thus hereditary instinct, ages old, usurped the functions of his untaught mind and saved

him from transgressing a worldwide law of whose very existence he was ignorant.”14

Tarzan is the epitome of what men in the 19th-20th century exchange wished to be: wild

and masculine, yet refined and dignified. The last thing that made men feel as if they

were being feminized was when women entered the workplace. In the late 19th century,

women began to work jobs such as sales clerks and representatives. Previously, mainly

men made money for the family. But at this point, millions of women entered the

workplace and started taking jobs from men. This is all because of industrialization. If
14
Edgar Rice Burrough, Tarzan of the Apes. Frank A. Munsey Company, 1912, 98
people had never moved away from their agricultural lifestyles, men would never have

felt emasculated and would not have to look for other means to feel secure to be a man.

Later 19th century and the early 20th century immigration greatly affected a

previously established protestant following in America. As people continued to

immigrate into America, they brought with them, the religion that they had followed in

their previous country. As new religion continued to be introduced into America, usually

Catholicism, to America, it affected the well established protestant religion that was

already there. “A majority of “new immigrants” were not Protestants, and they spoke

languages… that were completely unfamiliar to Americans.”15 The non protestant

immigrants did not agree with the churches that were already built, so eventually, when

enough people had immigrated, they began building their own churches. As more

immigrants arrived, “Roman Catholics, who made up a majority of immigrants to

America in the Progressive Era, found the Catholic Church here well established.”16

Protestants did not like these new churches that the immigrants built. Most Immigrants

had different values and morals. For example, some of the immigrants were very heavy

drinkers, something that Protestants found immoral and conflicted with their ethics.

“Religious institutions played central roles in immigrant’s lives… Because the American

government did not sponsor or finance religion, however, immigrants had to create and

manage their own houses of worship.”17 This meant the immigrants could take their

religion less seriously if they wished to. If they did not want religion to epitomize their

life, it did not have to, something else the Protestants disapproved of. Lastly, the
15
Stephen J. Diner, A Very Different Age: Americans of the Progressive Era. Boston: Hill and Wang,
1998, 102
16
Stephen J. Diner, A Very Different Age: Americans of the Progressive Era. Boston: Hill and Wang,
1998, 107
17
Stephen J. Diner, A Very Different Age: Americans of the Progressive Era. Boston: Hill and Wang,
1998, 107
immigrants created their own religious schools. “Many immigrant parents, particularly

Catholics and Lutherans, also thought the public schools threatened their religious values,

and sent their children to alternative parochial schools.”18 Clearly, both the Protestants

and the immigrant’s religions conflicted and affect one another. Overall, religion in

America was greatly changed by the urbanization of immigrants of different religions.

Perhaps the most important reason why change occurred was the idea of mass

production. The idea of many people working side by side to make one item was a fairly

new idea. George Pullman for example, spent most of his life designing trains. His most

famous idea was the sleeping car, but he invented many others as well, including the

dining car, the chair car, and the restaurant car all represented his ideas, and he

accomplished these through mass production. However, Pullman did not represent the

only person whose factories worked on trains. It was common for factories to produce

items associated with trains, like railroad tracks. There were, “twenty-four railroads

running out of Chicago—with a combined capital of $818 million, with 221,000

employees.”19 Mass production is directly related to the industrialization of America.

Due to better farming technology which required fewer workers, some farm laborers

began to look for jobs and found them in the factories. Eventually, in the early 20th

century, blacks also came north in search of ways to make money. However, immigrants

represented a larger percentage of the workers. At first employers had to pay their

workers high wages because the workers demanded a higher standard of living.

However, these workers were not the only ones in need of jobs; immigrants did too.

“Most of the immigrants who came to America between 1890 and World War I sought
18
Stephen J. Diner, A Very Different Age: Americans of the Progressive Era. Boston: Hill and Wang,
1998, 111
19
Ray Ginger, "Compulsory Heaven at Pullman", in Altgeld's America: The Lincoln Ideal Versus
Changing Realities. New York: New Viewpoints, 1958: 147
economic opportunity.”20 Whereas the Americans believed their standard of living was

poor, “This was the life to which thousands of hopeful immigrants had flocked, including

a new wave of Slavs, Hungarians, and Italians… The new arrivals were disliked by the

English-speaking workers because they worked harder for less;”21 For a lower price, the

immigrants were willing to work harder and quicker.

Industrialization led to a greater economic wealth within society, while at the

same time Puritan ideals were changing to a status based materialistic culture. These

combined changes caused several cultural changes within American society in the late

19th century through the beginning of the 20th century.

20
Stephen J. Diner, A Very Different Age: Americans of the Progressive Era. Boston: Hill and Wang,
1998: 77
21
Barbara Freese, “Coal: A Human History,” New York: Penguin Books, 2003: 139-140

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