The Gilded Age

1
The Gilded Age

• Cultural Focus
• 1865-1912
• Effect on Women
• With highlights from
• Kate Chopins
• The Awakening
• By Hedy Laverdiere

2
The Gilded Age was an era of extreme wealth
juxtaposed with extreme poverty.
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(William Merritt Chase)
3
The RICH
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(William Merritt Chase)
4
THE Mrs. Astor
(Caroline Webster Schermerhorn Astor), (The
Gilded Age).
For a fascinating glimpse into Mrs. Astors High
Society, click the photo.
5
1892, William Vanderbilts Marble House in
Newport, RI. A summer cottage presented as a
gift to his wife. (Newport Mansions The Guilded
Age. )
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1895, Cornelius Vanderbilts The Breakers in
Newport, RI. (Newport Mansions)
1898, Rosecliff was built for Mrs. Hermann
Oelrichs in Newport, RI. (Newport Mansions)
(Gilded Age)
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The POOR
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(The History Place Child Labor in America
1908-1912 )
7
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(The History Place Child Labor in America
1908-1912 )
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(Jacob Riis )
9
Kate Chopin
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Click the PHOTO for details on the characters in
The Awakening. Click the TITLE for the etext of
The Awakening.
(Kate Chopin A Woman Ahead of Her Time)
10
The ladies spent their time promenading on the
sea front, visiting reading-rooms and libraries,
shopping, enjoying rural carriage-rides, holding
At Homes, musical soirées and dinner parties
(Victorianweb.org)
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(William Merritt Chase)
11
The Gold Rush of the previous period from
1850-1860s spurred the movement
west. 1865 Native Americans attack the would-be
railroad town of Julesburg, Colorado to retaliate
for Sand Creek. President Lincoln asks senator
Oakes Ames to assist in managing the Union
Pacific Railroad. On April 9th, the Civil War
ends. Five days later, President Abraham Lincoln
is assassinated. 6000 Chinese men, 80 of the
crew, begin hand-drilling twelve tunnels across
the Sierra Nevada for the Central Pacific
railroad. (One Hundred Years Toward Suffrage An
Overview)
(William Merritt Chase)
12
1866 The American Equal Rights Association was
formed by Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B.
Anthony, whose goal was universal suffrage for
white and black women and black men. (One Hundred
Years Toward Suffrage An Overview)
(William Merritt Chase)
13
The local paper listed weekly the arrivals and
departures of visitors and the address at which
they were staying. These names were listed in
order of social prestige and almost always headed
by one or two titled persons. (Victorianweb.org)
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(William Merritt Chase)
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Suffragist Leaders
Lucretia Mott
Click the photos for links to each suffragist.
Susan B. Anthony
Elizabeth Cady Stanton
Carrie Chapman Catt
(Not For Ourselves Alone), (The Lucretia Coffin
Mott Papers Project), (Carrie Chapman Catt
Girlhood Home)
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1868 . . . The first passenger train travels
across the Sierra Nevada into Reno. Ratification
of the 14th Amendment, which provides protections
of all citizens of the Constitution against
unjust state laws, yet defines "citizens" and
"voters" as "male.(One Hundred Years Toward
Suffrage An Overview)
(Central Pacific Railroad No. 1 Gov. Stanford)
16
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The rich socialized only with others of their
class, but lived in constant domestic and trade
contact with the working class.
(Victorianweb.org)
(William Merritt Chase)
17
1868 Native American leader Red Cloud leads
uprisings called Red Clouds War. The leader
forces the military to remove themselves from the
Bozeman Trail before he will sign the Powder
River Treaty. The treaty guaranteed the Sioux
their hunting ground forever. Red Cloud is
considered to be the only native leader to have
won a war with the United States. The treaty is
violated in 1889. (One Hundred Years Toward
Suffrage An Overview)
Blue Cloud Abbey Native American Photograph
Collection
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1869 Due to the 14th Amendment ratification,
Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony form
the more radical, New York-based National Woman
Suffrage Association. The more conservative
American Woman Suffrage Association is also
formed by Julia Ward Howe, Lucy Stone and Henry
Blackwell. (One Hundred Years Toward Suffrage An
Overview)
(By Popular Demand Votes for Womens Suffrage
Pictures, 1850-1920)
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Well-to-do ladies provided work for hundreds of
tradeswomen such as milliners, staymakers,
straw-hat makers, furriers and dressmakers,
laundresses and ironers. The wealthy usually had
a set of live-in servants and sometimes
day-servants too. (Victorianweb.org)
(William Merritt Chase)
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1870 The 15th Amendment gives the right to vote
to black men. NWSA argues for a 16th Amendment
providing universal suffrage. (Slavery), (One
Hundred Years Toward Suffrage An Overview)