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The Gilded Age
The significant events and key historical figures of the Guilded Age. -
Rockefeller forms the Standard Oil Company
The Standard Oil Company of Ohio, focused on oil refining, which had less variable costs than oil exploration and drilling. Rockefeller’s contemporaries often commented on his fixation with cost-saving and waste-reduction, but in order to be the best, he also invested in research and development. Standard Oil brought as much labor in-house as they could and focused on finding markets for refinery by-products. -
Ulysses S. Grant Re-elected
On election day, November 3, 1868, forty-six-year-old Ulysses S. Grant was in Galena, Illinois. Grant had over three million votes but only won the popular vote by 400,000. The Military Reconstruction Act of 1867 had divided the former Confederate states into five military districts. One aspect of this military rule was African American men in these jurisdictions were granted suffrage, and under federal protection they voted overwhelmingly for Grant. Ulysses S. Grant was now President-elect. -
The Controversial presidential election of 1876
Rutherford B. Hayes (Republican) defeated Samuel J. Tilden (Democrat) in the controversial presidential election of 1876. Although Tilden won the popular vote, he was one vote short of winning an Electoral College majority, with the electoral votes of Louisiana, Florida, and South Carolina still in dispute, as well as one electoral vote in Oregon. In order to resolve the conflict, Congress created an Electoral Commission that eventually decided the election in favor of Hayes in March 1877. -
The Great Railroad Strike of 1877
The Railroad Strike of 1877 was a series of violent rail strikes across the US. On July 16, 1877, workers at the B&O station at Martinsburg, West Virginia, responded to the announcement of 10 percent wage cuts by uncoupling the locomotives in the station, confining them in the roundhouse, and declaring that no trains would leave Martinsburg unless the cut was rescinded. The strike had begun spreading along the mainline of the B&O all the way to Chicago, and till the Pennsylvania Railroad. -
The Pendleton Act
The Pendleton Act provided that federal government jobs be awarded on the basis of merit and that government employees be selected through competitive exams. The act also made it unlawful to fire or demote for political reasons employees who were covered by the law. The law further forbade requiring employees to give political service or contributions. The Civil Service Commission was established to enforce this act. -
The Haymarket Riot
The Haymarket Riot occurred on May 4, 1886, when a labor protest rally near Chicago’s Haymarket Square turned into a riot after someone threw a bomb at police. At least eight people died as a result of the violence that day. The Haymarket Riot was viewed as a setback for the organized labor movement in America, which was fighting for rights like the eight-hour workday. At the same time, many in the labor movement viewed the convicted men as martyrs. -
Homestead Strike
In July 1892, a dispute between Carnegie Steel and the Amalgamated Association of Iron and Steel Workers exploded into violence at a steel plant owned by Andrew Carnegie in Homestead, Pennsylvania. In what would be one of the deadliest labor-management conflicts in the nation’s history, some 12 people were killed when striking workers attacked 300 Pinkerton detectives hired by the plant’s management as security guards. -
Pullman Strike
The Pullman Strike (May–July 1894) was a widespread railroad strike and boycott that disrupted rail traffic in the U.S. Midwest in June–July 1894. Responding to layoffs, wage cuts, and firings, workers at Pullman Palace Car Company in Chicago went on strike, and, eventually, some 125,000–250,000 railroad workers in 27 states joined their cause, stifling the national rail network west of Chicago. -
William McKinley elected as president
William McKinley was the 25th President of the United States, serving from March 4, 1897, until his assassination on September 14, 1901, after leading the nation to victory in the Spanish-American War and raising protective tariffs to promote American industry. When McKinley became President, the depression of 1893 had almost run its course and with it the extreme agitation over silver. During his 14 years in the House, he became the leading Republican tariff expert.