What you’ll learn to do: describe the changes and challenges brought about by urbanization and immigration in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries

Figure 1. Immigrants on Ellis Island.

Urbanization spread rapidly in the mid-nineteenth century due to a confluence of factors. New technologies, such as electricity and steam engines, transformed factory work, allowing factories to move closer to urban centers and away from the rivers that had previously been vital sources of both water power and transportation. The growth of factories—as well as innovations such as electric lighting, which allowed them to run at all hours of the day and night—created a massive need for workers, who poured in from rural areas of the United States and from eastern and southern Europe.

The burgeoning cities brought together both rich and poor, working-class and upper-class, immigrants and native-born Americans; however, the realities of urban dwellers’ lives varied dramatically based on their position in the socio-economic hierarchy. The discrepancies in these lifestyles were noted by writers and artists of the time period, who depicted urban life in various media. Some focused on the good: highlighting the uniqueness of urban life, the diversity of cityscapes, the architecture, and the new adaptive roles that people took on. Others examined darker topics: wealth inequality, crime, disease, the dangers of working in factories, the problems with sanitation and overcrowding, and other harsh realities of urban life.

This period of rapid urban growth presented new challenges for Americans as they adjusted to new realities, new roles, new neighbors, and a new cultural landscape. The following sections will demonstrate the dramatic impact that these adjustments and challenges had on America’s future.