For Wednesday, February 20

Read, in Fink,

7.1 John W. Holway, a Pinkerton Guard, Views the Battle of Homestead, 1992 189 - 193

7.2 Eugene V. Debs Denounces the Role of the Corporation and the Courts in the Pullman Strike, 1895 193 - 194

The Depression of the 1890s (Painter) 201 - 208

Thanks to Josh Stein for taking my class on Friday.  I'll show the last few minutes of the video and then we'll proceed to a general discussion of labor
unrest as described below.

Changes on this scale could not occur without serious disruptions, among them economic cycles of boom and bust and ongoing conflicts between management and labor, which found itself at considerable disadvantage in this new industrial reality.  We'll look at two instances of labor conflicts, the Homestead Strike and the Pullman Strike, each of which turned remarkably violent, each of which saw government intervening on the side of the corporation, and each of which raised serious questions about the survival of equalitarian principles in this new industrial age.

NOTE:  The strikes at Homestead, Pennsylvania and Pullman, Illinois, were made particularly vivid by the rapidly improving photographic techniques which made a real "photo-journalism" possible.  As you consider what you read, think about how pictures of militia encampments in the middle of towns would make your particular character react.  You'll see some of these at linked websites above.

READ, in Schlereth,
    Chapter 3:  Housing pp. 87- 116           (to the section House Spaces)

Download and Read:

From How the other Half Lives, (Jacob Riis)

Chapter I.  The Genesis of the Tenement  Available at http://www.cis.yale.edu/amstud/inforev/riis/chap1.html
Chapter II.  The Awakening  Available at http://www.cis.yale.edu/amstud/inforev/riis/chap2.html

          From Century Magazine

City Dwellings I. Mrs. Schuyler van Rensselaer:  Available at http://cdl.library.cornell.edu/cgi-bin/moa/moa-cgi?notisid=ABP2287-0031-124

City Dwellings II. Mrs. Schuyler van Rensselaer:  Available at http://cdl.library.cornell.edu/cgi-bin/moa/moa-cgi?notisid=ABP2287-0031-154

Today we start a unit on the American House of the 1890s.  Owning a home of one's own has long been a central part of the American Dream, and in the 1890s there were some interesting changes in the technology of housing and transportation which made this dream accessible to more people than before.  There were also changes in the financial structure which made their own contributions.  Shelereth will shed light on these.

Not all Americans were in a position to capitalize on these, of course.  Reading the first two chapters of Jacob Riis' classic expose of tenement life will give shed light on one side of Urban life.  Recognize that the tenement of the 1890s represented a reform of conditions deemed worse.

Mrs. van Rensselaer was in no danger of being forced into tenement living.  Her essay presents the other side of the coin.  The observations of Riis and van Rensselaer were widely available.  Your individual characters had both dreams and realities concerning housing.  Try to look at these readings from your contemporary perspective and the perspectives of your characters at the turn of the century, as well.