Labor’s Response
to Industrialism
GOALS OF
INDUSTRIALISTS
EFFECT ON
WORKERS
RESPONSE FROM
WORKERS
STEEL WORKERS IN
HOMESTEAD, PA
• GOALS OF INDUSTRIALISTS
• Lower costs
• Maximize profits
• EFFECT ON WORKERS
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Hard manual labor
Dangerous working conditions
Low pay
Long hours
• RESPONSE FROM WORKERS
WORKERS’ HOUSING IN
HOMESTEAD, PA
• GOALS OF INDUSTRIALISTS
• Immediately available work force
• Profited from worker rent
• EFFECT ON WORKERS
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Exposed to pollution
Isolated from community schools and shopping districts
Paid in scrip
Provide services (i.e., libraries)
Small number were black
1 million women employed
1/3 were foreign born
COAL MINERS IN
PENNSYLVANIA
• EFFECT ON WORKERS
• Factories were badly lighted, poorly ventilated, &
hazardous
• Owners did not pay for safety features
• Textile workers inhaled dust & fibers
• Coal miners risked explosions & cave-ins
• Almost 2 million American children, aged 10 to 15,
worked
WORKERS TAKE
ACTION
• RESPONSE FROM WORKERS
• Knights of Labor – founded in 1869 by Terence Powderly
• Campaigned for an 8 hour day, safer working conditions,
compensation for injury, & equal pay for women
• Opposed strikes, allowed women, blacks, & unskilled to join
• American Federation of Labor (AFL) – founded by
Samuel Gompers in 1881
• Invited only white, male, & skilled to join
• Goals – 8 hour day & the right to collective bargaining
• International Workers of the World – led by Big Bill
Haywood
• Believed in strikes, slowdowns, & giving power to the
working class
WORKERS TAKE
ACTION
• RESPONSE FROM WORKERS
• Haymarket Square Riot (1886)
• 8000 workers in Chicago ( with the Knights of Labor) went
on strike demanding an 8-hour day and workers were killed
• At a protest rally, a bomb was thrown at the police & 7
policemen & 4 civilians were killed
• The public turned against the Knights
• Carnegie Steel Strike
• Workers’ strike after a wage cut & the plant was closed
• Guards hired to protect the plant attacked & 16 guards and
workers died
• PA National Guard stopped the riot & many lost jobs
• Railroad Strike of 1894
• Pullman Railway Car Company workers went on strike
protesting high prices & rent in their company town after
wage cuts
• Strike spread across the U.S. & President Grover Cleveland
sent in troops to halt the strike
Exit Slip 10/3/2014
How might each of these 19th century
Americans – a factory owner, a factory
worker, and a consumer – have
responded to the statement:
Industrialization has improved life in
America.
Exit Slip 10/3/2014
How might each of these 19th century
Americans – a factory owner, a factory
worker, and a consumer – have
responded to the statement:
Industrialization has improved life in
America.