History 371

Devine

Spring 2014

 

Study Questions for Porter, “Industrialization and the Rise of Big Business”

 

1. How did the pre-Civil War American economy differ from the post-Civil War economy?

 

 

2. In asking why the economy changed during the late 19th century, why are “greed” and the “evil genius of the Robber Barons” answers that are too simplistic?

 

 

 

3. Despite some uneasiness, why were most Americans willing to accept the new industrial economy?

 

 

 

4. As the economy industrialized who won and who lost?  

 

 

 

5. Why did steel become a “big business” whereas women’s fashion and jewelry did not?

 

 

 

6. How were the new and powerful “big businesses” different than those that had preceded them?

 

 

 

7. How did the railroads and telegraph create a “national market”? How did the emergence of railroads enable companies to expand the scale and scope of their production?

 

 

8. What was “vertical integration”? How did this process lead to the emergence of powerful big businesses?

 

 

 

9. What strategy did Rockefeller’s Standard Oil pursue that ultimately enabled it to control 90 percent of the nation’s oil refining capacity?