The Rich and the "Other Half" in Turn-of-the-Century America

 

The "Gilded" World

The Great Homes of America's Gilded Age   Gilded Age: Resources Compiled by The Pennsylvania Council for Social Studies   The American Experience Andrew Carnegie Gilded Age Includes information on economic and material differences between classes and resulting conflicts.   Thorstein Veblen The Theory of the Leisure Class, 1899-- "plain free vanilla e-text at Project Gutenberg" or searchable HTML Theory of the Leisure Class at the University of Virginia or excerpts from Modern History Sourcebook   Views of the Wealthy Turn-of-the-century cartoons published by The Ram's Horn, an Interdenominational Social Gospel Magazine, courtesy of Ohio State

---

"The Other Half"

"An East-Side Ramble," by William Dean Howells Impressions and Experiences (New York: Harpers & Brothers, 1896).   On the Lower East Side A website developed as part of the Lower Manhattan Project in 1993.   How the Other Half Lives, Jacob Riis Riis used sensational prose and photographs to expose the horrifying conditions endured by those who lived in the tenements of Manhattan at the turn of the century. You can read the sequel, "The Battle with the Slum" and other works by Riis at Bartleby.Com. For additional information on Riis, see the Museum Of The City Of New York -- Jacob Riis Exhibition.   Twenty Years at Hull House Chapter, by Jane Adams

---

You can also use Search Engines at the Lyceum locate additional resources on the web.

---

Go to

Wharton Assignment and Project Resources

Home Page for Lucia Knoles Department of English, Assumption College

The Search for Improvement in Antebellum America Project in Progress