Unit 3: Women and the Gilded Age Flashcards
(17 cards)
What is the name of an organisation that advocated for temperance in the Gilded Age?
- The Women’s Christian Temperance Union
- By 1900, it had over 175,000 members
- It gave women an outlet for political action, creating a sense of unity
What was the name given to the form of social activism that many women engaged in starting from 1880?
- Municipal housekeeping
- It involved working to improve areas of society like healthcare, education and recreation at a grassroots level
- An example of municipal housekeeping is the organisation called the National Association of Colored Women, which provided access to libraries and healthcare for African American women that the white power structure deprived them of
What were the two main organisations advocating for women’s suffrage and when did they merge?
- The American Women’s Suffrage Association
- The National Women’s Suffrage Association
- They merged to form the National American Women’s Suffrage Association in 1890
What laws were passed in the Gilded Age that improved married women’s rights?
- Although denied the right to vote, women experienced several gains as a result of the suffrage movement
- Of these, some of the most significant ended women’s ‘civil death’ upon marrying
- The new laws allowed married women to own property and litigate
What were settlement houses?
- Establishments that middle-class women set up to improve the quality of life of disadvantaged women
- They included libraries, clinics and vocational training
- The most famous was Hull House, set up by Jane Addams
- There were hundreds across the country by the end of the Gilded Age
What are some examples of unions that accepted women in the Gilded Age?
- The Daughters of St Crispin, which persuaded the Cigarmakers Union and the National Typographic Union to admit women
- The Knights of Labor, which had 50,000 female members
What were some instances of female union activity?
- In 1869, laundresses in Troy, New York, went on strike. Though long lasting, the strikers eventually had to capitulate due to a lack of money and were forced to sign a yellow-dog contract
- In 1884, women working in the textile and hatmaking industry went on strike
What proportion of women were employed by the turn of the century?
One in seven
Which industries saw gains in female employment as a result of the economic growth in the Gilded Age?
Clerical work, teaching and sales jobs
How did educational access for women change in the Gilded Age?
- Many colleges, such as Mount Holyoke and Radcliffe, opened their doors to women in the Gilded Age
- Many medical and low schools also began admitting women
What were the challenges associated with women and educational access?
- There were still many more opportunities for men
- Women were consistently discriminated against; for example, Myra Bradwell, a women seeking admittance to the bar, was turned down by the Illinois Supreme Court
- 75% of women who earned a degree did not go on to marry, illustrating the great difficulty of being a wife and leading a career in the Gilded Age
Which two states had granted women the right to vote by 1870?
- Wyoming and Utah
- They did this party in an attempt to attract more women from the East to boost population growth
What opportunities did women in the West have?
- Many opportunities for political activism in organisations like the Populist Party
- Women helped support community structures, engaging in municipal housekeeping
- Some women were able to utilise the Homestead Act and own land in the West
Why did women’s suffrage make little progress during the period?
- Gender discrimination among men and women remained pervasive, pushing the notion that women lacked the faculties to make informed electoral decisions or were too ‘morally pure’ to engage with politics
- Divisions within the suffrage movement, even after the NWSA and AWSA merged
- These barriers meant the two states, Wyoming and Utah, that did give women the right to vote did so independent of the suffrage movement
Despite gains, what was the most common job for a woman to hold during the Gilded Age?
- Domestic servant
- This was especially true for black women, who very rarely held white collar jobs, and the influx of immigrants during the Gilded Age
- This is in spite of the percentage of women who worked outside of the home increasing
What problems did employed women face?
- Most work for women was only temporary and did not provide stable income
- In the Gilded Age, there was a pronounced wage gap, with the average female wage being $6 per week, which was lower than the cost of living
How were women excluded from unions and what effect did this have on their rights?
- Many large unions, such as the American Federation of Labor, excluded female workers from their ranks
- This meant women were afforded little protection in industry, rendering them vulnerable to exploitation
- Consequently, women often faced low wages, long hours, temporary work and few safety regulations
