U.S. Economic History - AP U.S. History

Gold was found at Sutter’s Mill in Northern California in January of 1848, weeks before the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo made California an American territory. The ever present desire for gold led people to endure brutal travel either overland in stagecoaches or wagon trains, or by sailing to Panama and crossing the Isthmus by foot.

Before the invention of the cotton gin, cotton was notoriously difficult to profitably produce. Cotton is encased in a hard shell - extracting it and removing excess material was a time consuming and costly process. The cotton gin, by mechanizing the process, dramatically increased the amount of cotton that a plantation owner could produce and made the cash crop extremely profitable again. However, in order to process the cotton it first needed to be picked - which called for an influx of a massive number of forced laborers (slaves). More than one of the answers presented here are true, however the key component is "most significant". The massive importation of slaves to harvest cotton probably prolonged the death of slavery by several years in the South and has ramifications for the economic, social and political make-up of America to this day.

Samuel Colt, of Colt 45 fame, is the inventor credited with mass-producing the revolver for the first time.

It was the establishment of the telegraph that rendered the Pony Express obsolete.

The cotton gin (short for engine) was invented by the Connecticut born Eli Whitney in 1793, and quickly the model spread throughout Southern plantations. The cotton gin was able to separate the cotton fibers from the seeds extremely quickly and efficiently, and allowed the production of cotton to increase exponentially. This meant that Southern plantation owners also increased their importation and trade of slaves, leading to a boom in the Southern slave population.

The Panic of 1873 was one of the worst world wide economic depressions until the Great Depression occurred in 1929. The Panic began after widespread railroad speculation in the post Civil War era overstretched financial resources throughout the country. After the failure of a handful of railroads, banks themselves failed causing widespread unemployment, inflation, and bank runs. The depression would last until 1879, covering all of Ulysses S. Grant's second term in office.

A rich and powerful businessman of the 1800s, pejoratively named a Robber Baron, would not have supported the workers' right to unionize as this would have worked against his business interests.

The Pacific Railroad Act of 1862 chartered the Union Pacific Railroad Company and the Central Pacific Railroad Company to construct a railroad linking the west with the established eastern railroads.

The Whiskey Rebellion was an oftenviolent protest by grain and corn farmers against Federal taxes levied on whiskey intended, primarily, to help pay for the nation's assumed war debt.

The Homestead Acts, first passed during the Civil War, offered free land grants to anyone who had not previously “taken up arms against the Union.” The land offered generally, although not always, amounted to roughly one-hundred and sixty acres. Between the period of 1862 and 1934, the Federal government granted 1.6 million homesteads to American families (roughly ten-percent of United States land was appropriated) and it was a big motivational factor behind the consistent westward expansion of the American people in that time period. The Homestead Acts were officially repealed in the 1970s.

The success of Bacon's Rebellion, in 1676, allowed for the change from indentured servants to slaves as the first major migration of indentured servants became free. The rebellion looted plantations and took over the government for a short period of time, but later led to the increase of African slaves.

Named for their bags made from old carpets, these Northerners who moved South during the Reconstruction Era for generally financial purposes were derisively known as carpetbaggers.

Finished in 1825, the Erie Canal runs across New York State, connecting the Atlantic Ocean with the Great Lakes.

The cotton gin was invented in 1793 by Eli Whitney. The invention of the cotton gin was important for a number of economic and social reasons. Firstly, it enabled for mechanized removal of seeds from cotton, a process that had previously been extremely labor intensive. This change allowed for rapid growth of cotton plantations throughout the South and the growth of the Southern agricultural system. Secondly, as a result of being extremely profitable, it provided a massive boost to the slave trade. Previous cash crops had been slowly growing less profitable due to the intensity of work required to harvest; however, the cotton gin instantly transformed the production of cotton into a profitable venture. Many historians contend that, without the invention of the cotton gin, the social and economic growth of the South would have been radically different.

Samuel Slater was a British-born industrialist who came to America towards the end of the eighteenth century. He is generally credited with having brought the Industrial Revolution to the United States, in the form of textile factories.

The steel plow was invented by John Deere in 1837. Deere moved to Illinois and worked as a blacksmith for many years; as the story goes, he was attempting to use a cast-iron plow and found that it was unsuited to the rough soil of Illinois, so he fashioned a steel plow. The importance of the steel plow to the growth of American agriculture, industry, and society would be difficult to overstate. It is generally referred to as the invention that opened up the West. It allowed farmers to work land previously thought untenable and greatly increased individual profits.

Shortly after the creation of the new country, New York was expanding but faced a geographical problem. Although blessed with a safe, natural harbor, getting supplies to ships at that harbor was difficult, as the Hudson River connected to no other major watersheds. New York Governor DeWitt Clinton helped remedy this by building a canal from the Hudson River to the Great Lakes, cutting across the length of the state. The canal allowed crops and resources from the Midwest to reach the Eastern seaboard through New York Harbor, and New York City quickly became the nation's largest metropolis.

Vertical integration describes the process by which a company seeks to acquire every element of the production chain to keep costs down. The practice was innovated by Carnegie Steel in the 1880s, which not only owned steel mills, but iron ore mines, distribution systems, and sales operations. Vertical integration became a key to the rise of many monopolies during the Gilded Age and remains a favored corporate tactic today.

Cotton was the main source of income for the South during the Civil War. A major reason for Southern resistance to the abolition of slavery (aside from racism) was economic. Unpaid labor supported the Southern States most profitable economic activity.

The 1890 Census declared that frontier was fully settled and no longer existed as it found that there was no longer any clear line of advancing settlement. The Dawes Act, the 1889 Oklahoma land rush, and the surrender of Geronimo were events of the 1880s that each concerned specific areas of the frontier and did not by themselves lead directly to the 1890 declaration that the frontier was fully settled. The Wounded Knee Massacre occurred in December 1890, concerned a small specific area of the frontier, and did not have a major impact on settlement.