Chapter 14+/4 Flashcards
(35 cards)
Where did the Industrial Revolution start?
New England
What term represents the historic change of working where you lived to working with a wage in factories and from making what you own to factories production? This is a focus change.
Industrial Revolution
What was the cotton gin?
A machine that quickly and easily removed the seeds from picked cotton.
Why was the cotton gin important?
It increased productivity.
Who invented the cotton gin?
Eli Whitney
Why was the Industrial Revolution important to farming?
With the new devices being mass-manufactured, farming became easier and faster. Cotton boomed in the South, demand went up, and sadly so did the slave trade.
Why was the Industrial Revolution important to businesses?
Anyone could start a business, so that boomed. A lot of people left farming for factory work so cities and businesses grew.
What were interchangeable parts, and who came up with them?
Who - Eli Whitney
What - Everything was handmade so it was all different. If something broke the whole thing would be replaced, but Whitney started producing identical parts, so if one part broke, that would be the only part replaced.
How did interchangeable parts affect the community?
It was much cheaper for the buyer, but also less people began to buy from craftsmen so their business went down.
Significance of the growth of the factory system:
- More steps under 1 roof
- Workers specialized in 1 part of the process
- More stuff faster as a result
How did the social hierarchy of the South go (from richest to poorest)?
- Plantation owners (planters)
- Yeoman
- Non-farming whites
- Freed Af.-Amer.
What were some characteristics of planters?
- Wealthiest (controlled thousand of acres and hundreds of slaves)
- Often became or knew political leaders
- About 2% of Southern pop.
What were some characteristics of yeoman?
- Hardworking people, owned 50-200 acres and few or no slaves
- If they did own slaves they worked alongside them
- About 14% of Southern pop.
What were some characteristics of non-farming whites?
- Not very wealthy, lived on hard cash-crop growing land so didn’t benefit from Cotton Boom
- Did odd jobs, hunted, fished, and grew small gardens for a living
What were some characteristics of freed African-Americans?
- Roughly 250,000 lived in the South
- Worked as paid laborers or artisans
- Faced discrimination; couldn’t vote, travel freely, or hold certain jobs
- About 2% of Southern pop.
What percent of people in the South was made up of slaves?
32%
Why was it often forbidden for slaves to learn to read or write?
- Would help to communicate a plan or escape
- Give confidence
What was the labor like for slaves?
- Forced to work very hard
- Slaves held different jobs on the plantation
What kind of jobs did slaves hold on the plantation?
- Most worked in the fields in a labor group
- Other slaves worked in the owner’s home and took care of the owner’s family
- Some were skilled at jobs such as carpentry or blacksmithing
How were slaves treated?
- They were considered and treated like property, rather than human beings
- Punished harshly for disobedience
How did slaves get an education when they were forbidden to read and write?
They were taught in secret or learned from the bible
Could slaves practice religion?
Depended on the plantation, but they often practiced in secret.
Why was Christianity so important to many slaves?
It was a large part of many slaves’ lives, it gave them hope.
What is the importance of folktales?
Helped keep their traditions and culture alive, also helped teach lessons about how to survive as slaves
