Challenges of Urbanization

Challenges of Urbanization

Setting the Stage

▪ Making a living in the late 19th/early 20th century was not easy.

▪ Natural/economic disasters hit farmers hard in Europe and U.S. and

promise of industrial jobs brought millions of people to American cities.

▪ Urban population exploded from 10 million to 54 million between 1870

and 1920.

▪ The rapid growth of cities forced people to contend with problems of

housing, transportation, water, and sanitation.

▪ Why does it Matter?

– Residents of U.S. cities today enjoy vastly improved living conditions

Urban Opportunities

▪ Technological boom in the 19th century contributed to the growing industrial

strength of the U.S. and resulted in rapid urbanization

▪ Most immigrants who came to U.S. ended in cities because they were cheap

and most convenient place to live (By 1910, immigrants make up half the
pop in U.S. cities)

▪ Americanization Movement

– Designed to assimilate people of different cultures into the dominant culture
– Schools taught immigrants skills for citizenship (literacy, history, government) and

cooking/social etiquette

– Immigrants do not want to change their customs; Setup ethnic communities to keep

traditions (Ex. Little Italy, Chinatown)

Little
Italy
1900

Chinatown

1900

Migration from Country to City

▪ Inventions such as Reaper and Plow made farming more efficient

but meant fewer laborers were needed to work the land

▪ As more and more farms emerged, many rural people moved to

cities to find whatever work they could

▪ Southern farmers, especially African Americans, moved to cities

– 200,000 African Americans moved to cities like Chicago and Detroit
– Escaped racial violence, economic hardship, and political oppression
– Segregation/discrimination were common in Northern cities
– Job competition between blacks and white immigrants caused further

racial tension

Urban Problems

▪ As the urban population skyrocketed, city governments faced the

problems of how to provide residents with needed services and
safe living conditions

▪ Urban problems:

– Housing
– Transportation
– Water
– Sanitation
– Crime
– Fire

https://www.youtube
.com/watch?v=hKKz
UcqZgMY

Urban Problems: Housing

▪ Two options: house on outskirts of town or rent cramped rooms in

boarding houses

▪ Tenements begin to rise; sometimes 3 families living in 1 family

apartments (overcrowded and unsanitary)

▪ 1879—NYC passed a law that set standards for plumbing/ventilation in

apartments
– Tenements started to have air shafts and windows
– Garbage not picked up weekly, people would dump it in air shaft which then

attracted rats

– To keep out stench, people would nail air shaft shut (no ventilation)
– Tenements became worse to live in then converted single family homes

Urban Problems: Transportation

▪ Innovations in mass transit enabled

workers to go to and from jobs more
easily

▪ Street cars introduced in S.F. in 1873

and electric subways in Boston in 1897

▪ Mass transit linked urban areas to city

neighborhoods and suburbs

▪ Cities struggled to repair old transit

systems and to build new ones to
meet demand of population

Urban Problems: Water

▪ Cities faced the problem of supplying safe

drinking water.

▪ Cities began to build public waterworks to

provide water but many cities had inadequate
piped water or none at all

▪ Homes seldom had indoor plumbing and

residents had to collect water in buckets from
faucets on street (had to heat water to bathe)

▪ Disease such as cholera and typhoid fever began

to rise; filtration was introduced in 1870s and
chlorination in 1908

Urban Problems: Sanitation

▪ Horse manure piled up on the

streets, sewage flowed through
open gutters, and factories
spewed foul smoke into the air

▪ People dumped garbage in the

street (no garbage collection)

▪ By 1900, cities begin to develop

sewer lines and sanitation
departments

Urban Problems: Crime

▪ Pickpockets and thieves

flourished

▪ Most cities laws/police were

too small to have much
impact on crime

▪ NYC organized the 1st full

time police force in 1844

Urban Problems: Fire

▪ Spread of fires is contributed to limited water supplies in cities

▪ Most cities packed with wooden dwellings

▪ Candles and kerosene lamps also posed fire hazards

▪ Early firefighters:

– Volunteers who were not always available when they were needed
– Nation’s 1st paid fire department (1853—Cincinnati, Ohio)
– By 1900, most cities have full time fire departments
▪ 1874—introduction of automatic fire sprinklers and replacement

of wood with brick, stone, and concrete

Hoboken 1900

Great Fire of

1904-Baltimore,

Maryland

Reformers Mobilize

▪ As problems in cities mounted, Americans worked to find solutions; social welfare

reformers targeted their efforts at relieving urban poverty
– Social Gospel Movement—preached salvation through service to the poor

▪ Settlement House Movement

– Settlement houses establish in late 1800s (community centers that provided

aid)

– Run largely by middle-class, college educated women, settlement houses

provided educational, cultural, and social services

– Jane Addams founded the Hull House in Chicago in 1889; provided classes in

numerous subjects and healthcare

▪ By 1910, 400 settlement houses were operating in cities all over the country

Jane Addams

Hull House

Today=Haunted