American Studies: The American Industrial Revolution

1. The first railroad that connected east and west coasts was the transcontinental railroad, it was finished by 1869. The transcontinental railroad is now a common name for a railroad that connects the a coast to coast. The railroad that completed the links between eastern and western Canada was The Canadian Pacific Railway. It was completed by November 7th 1885.

2. The timezones that had the greatest number of railroads in 1890 was the central time, they had railroads connecting every state. They had much more than one in every state. They grew in Mountain time, Central time and Eastern time.

3.The daily life of people changed in positive ways: Industry became common. Therefore jobs were easily procurable for people. Another important detail is electric lightning. Up until 1865 electric lightning did not exist indoors, after dark people usually used oil lamps or lit candles. Though after 1865 electricity was easily procurable to about anyone. Also ice was not available to people, though it was usually very expensive. Finally By 1860 long distance communication was faster, about ten days to get to east coast and three weeks to get to the west. However, immigrant living on the frontier would have to wait several months for news from relatives in Europe. Even in technology people made more inventions (typewriter, telephone and phonograph) when they made them they had a license that allowed them to sell them. (1900) People invested a lot in these new inventions, more specifically European and American business leaders. Finally by 1990's America's standard of living was among the highest in the world.

4. Electric power and communication affected life of people and businesses in various ways. Electricity helped to improve the productivity of business world and transform the nature of workplace. For instance things got faster, an example of this improvement of technology is the sewing machine. When the sewing machine became electric (1889) there was a rapid growth of the ready-made clothing industry. Therefore with electricity a worker could make more in less time. This made the prices of each item decrease. These growing industries needed a lot of workers, thus they offered jobs. These jobs were majorly taken by immigrants (children and woman). Even food spoilage didn't happen often, because refrigerators preserved food. Of course not all of the electricity was distributed equally. Rural areas went without electricity for decades. Currently in the world urban areas all have electricity, while rural areas have to fight to have a little electricity. Therefore, things didn't change much after all these years. The negative effects are that people still need electricity, but they can't have it. Positive ones are that production became faster, and preservation of food and other important resources are know possible.

5. Railroads created a national network, they also developed the industrial growth. The railroad would carry goods and passengers. This also helped in the development of countries (development of towns.) The railroad owners looking to expand their businesses and increase profits, began building towns near their railroads on land granted to them by the government. Therefore, economy rose at the same time as industrial growth.

6. Bessemer Process: The Bessemer process was a way to make steel easily. The nation depended on steel therefore they could have steel much more easily. This was positive because they could build skyscrapers. This then brought people to move in urban areas. They then had a new home and they would look for a job. This will eventually make people richer.

7. Technology is important it makes communication easier and quicker. It simplified every day life. People could communicate with people in an effective way. For instance this steel was stronger more easily bended (flexible). Therefore buildings could be built

8. The Bessemer process helps make more steal and stronger steel. This helped Dubai make high quality buildings without any fear of breaking it. The economy got better, and people traveled faster. Steel brought changes, the skyscrapers improved in the Bessemer process. of course

Socratic Seminar

We had a seminar in class, and to be honest it wasn't our best class. Chaos happened and all of us are responsible of our acts. Though I thought a good point that was made in class was a little talk about corruption and money issues. Money is an important thing in life and to have it people do about anything. Selling drugs and stealing are two of the major ways people gain money if they are in need. Though others try to use corruption, such as police officers, to gain even more money. This is an untrustworthy way of gaining money and it gives the nation a really bad reputation. Hanane, Myriam and Shemsi participated in this seminar really well and made really intelligent comments that made me change my point of view on several points. Some people were really participating while others were taking notes, of course everyone had a different point of view concerning this subject. Unfortunately we could not finish the Seminar because of our unacceptable behavior. If I could improve what we did I would have participated more and made more concise comments. I would also like to present everyone's apology to our substitute: Miss Conway ♥ (sorry if I misspelled. )
:)

Hope for Haiti

Last week, January 12th a horrible earthquake struck Haiti. It lasted about 35 seconds and had several aftershocks. Three of them were of magnitude 5. However the major earthquake was of magnitude 7, which is of course a lot. Not only that, but several days ago a second earthquake hit Haiti, this one was of magnitude 6.3. This caused even more chaos. People die, and others were looking for people that are probably dead under stones. Many celebrities are trying to save up money to help these people. They do this because not only their houses are broken but this nation is extremely poor. People fight for their food, they fight to find somewhere decent to sleep in and they fight to find their loved ones. They lost everything, all that they built in these last years is ruined, all their hope is shattered.

Thankfully the UN have tried helping them, and they receive food and some shelter. Unfortunately they still need a lot of help, therefore people's help is needed. All around the world organizations are starting to help them. There is a new slogan that is used: Hope for Haiti. Celebrities collaborated together to create a song: Haiti mon amour. Some of these celebrities in Justin Timberlake and Rihanna. Hopefully this nightmare will be over soon.

Success and failures

Successes
-The union got back together, after years of disagreement a final resolution has been made about this issue.
-Freedom for African Americans that had to work for years before getting free. The civil brought freedom for a lot of them. Though as discussed in the failures, they were not equal.
-Everyone had education, even in the south. Therefor even African Americans could become literates.
Failures
-The failure is that it was hard for black people to get accepted into the community as physically and socially equal as white people. A rule should have been made making everyone equal, black and whites.
-Poverty, especially for African Americans, they had issues getting jobs because they were not treated equally. Of course other white man were poor also because jobs were not very easy to find and the war scavenged a lot of the southerns and norther's industries and land.
-Corruption, it was happening more and more often. Making people who didn't deserve to get richer much more powerful. Hardworking people often had less money than people who used corruption.
-KKK, this clan was powerful, and the Jim Craw Laws, those supported discrimination.
-The taxes got higher.
-Land was redistributed, in this case it was distributed equally for people.

Define.

Johnsonʼs Reconstruction Plan

 This was a plan that was based on Abraham's Lincoln, he only took off Lincoln's rule to have 10 percent of the citizens to have a constitutional convention. 

Black Codes

Those are laws laws that were for freemen only, it restricted them from doing things that white people could do. Those rules included:
Curfews: black people could not gather after sunset.

Vagrancy

 This law stated that if freedmen did not work they could be finned or whipped. They could even be sold for a year's labor.

Labor Contracts

The labor contracts consisted on making the slaves work for one year, if in the middle of the year they decided they did not want to work anymore they could lose their wages that they earned.

Land restrictions

Freed people could rent land or homes only in rural areas. This forced them to like on plantations.

14th & 15th Amendment

It guaranteed all citizens equal protection. Thus everyone could be equally protected, the fifteenth amendment stated that that voting would be allowed to all male citizens.

Radical Reconstruction

Radical reconstruction was a group of people who thought that the black codes were way too harsh, they wanted to stop the expansion of the black codes.

Carpetbagger

This was a negative nickname that was given to northern Republican's after they to move south after the civil war.

Scalawag 

This was a negative nickname for a white southern republican after the civil war.

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The Liberator special edition

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Last edition

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The civil war is over, but what are the real consequences? After four years and five months of war peace has finally reached America. No more fighting, no more destruction, but many thing changed.

After confederate soldiers came back, they came t o see their homes destroyed, all their delight for having won the war was turned into sorrow.

The confederate soldier Val C. Giles described his first moments after back from his perilous task:He reached his house, and even his dog, Brave didn't rrecognize him at first. His parents were not here to greet him, in fact he has been gone for so much time that they did not expect him to come back. The soldiers saw all their past life destroyed, they defended their cause but their life changed in ways that you can't imagine.

The period of reconstruction now started in this year of 1865. Now that the war is over many houses have been destructed, thus America needs this period of reconstruction. This reconstruction program was mainly needed by the southern states since as we all know the southern states were much more affected then the northern states. Talking about the southern states, the people are going to have a lot of work to do, not only for yed To add even more damage 9,000 miles of railroads were also destroyed. The civil war even took over their farmland, their farm buildings, and their farm machinery. In fact they lost a lot of what they had. Though the Southern have less deaths then the northerners. In number the north lost 364,000, while the southerner's lost 260,000 soldiers. Nevertheless, one out of three southern men are killed or wounded. This then means that more children were orphans, and brides were now widows. The southerners are now divided in three groups:reconstruction but also for their economy that is very challenged. The southerns ship

ping industry is almost all destroyed, to be more precise two thirds of this industry got destroyed

Black southerners: Many freed people are starting their lives over in a poor region with not much economic activity. When they were slaves they did receive food and shelter, though know they don't get anything. Many of them spent their whole life working for the southerners, so after their freedom was found they are homeless, and hungry. However their freedom is found, and in my opinion that is the best reward. Though surprisingly, some slaves decided to go work as slaves once again. So was this war really worth it? Know that the slaves go back to their old life?

Plantation owners: The plantation owners are suffering a lot, they lost a great amount of money, worth 3 billion dollars of slave labor are lost. Not only that but the federal government took 100 million dollars of southern plantation in cottons. Thus they lost so much money that some can't hire workers anymore, others have to sell their properties to subside to their families needs.

Though the question that everyone is asking themselves is should

Poor white southerners: They can't find jobs as easily because know that freedmen were looking for jobs too thus they have more competition. Many of them are moving to Mississippi and Texas.

we forgive the southerners? Or punish them? and will the black man be treated equally? In my opinion the southerners will suffer enough economically, all their life is changing, that is a good enough punishment. However I strongly think that it will be hard for them to treat black people equally, for us northerners they are humans. Though for southerners they were used more as things then people. Before his death President Lincoln forgave the southerners, though he did not precise that the black Americans have the right to vote, also he did not say that the southern states were readmitted in the union. Today vice president Andrew Johnson took over. You may remember that he was poor, and became a slave owner as he grew up. Like president Lincoln he forgave southerners, he permitted each state to hold a constitutional convention. This was not exactly the same thing that Lincoln decided on since Lincoln said that they could form the constitutional convention only after 10 percent of voters in the state has sworn allegiance to the Union. Of course he decided that states needed to abolish slavery and repudiate the confederate debt. He also stated that states could rejoin the union after holding an election.

Know that slaves are free many things changed for every single one of them. Freedom is finally between their hands, they will be able to go outside, children will be able to play with other, mother's will not be separated from their children anymore. The joy was such as most of them cried of joy. After the war many found their loved ones in other plantations, since they were separated from them. Though we all know that freedom is only halfway found, many black leaders are persuaded that the freedom will come with economic independence. As you may know a proposal was made that freedmen would be able to take white-owned land. General William Tecumseh distributeted the land and gave 40 acres plot. Though personally I think that idea was too hard to cope with because every black family will want 40 acres of land. Of course some of the land was then returned to white owners. Many black Americans reunited together, they are even forming churches, others making groups that could involve anything such a drama groups or debating clubs.

As a human I think everyone has the right to learn. Did you know that 90 percent of black man are illiterate? Even after working all their lives as slaves they are still eager to learn. We should take example on them, we are always complaining while they work to learn. Many white teachers come to the southern states to teach freemen, other freemen are trying to teach themselves. Finally you I think you have all heard about the Freedman's Bureau. It gives out clothing, food, and medical supplies to everyone that is in need black or white.
This ends our last article, after the civil war and freedom retrieved I think that everything will get better. The hopes for the future are better then what I imagined. Thank you for following us.

The War in Afghanistan

The War in Afghanistan first started on 2001, it didn't stop. Even now the issue is still here. Though president President Obama is trying to end the war. Today, December 1st Obama changed his strategies and decided to send 30 000 to 35 000 additional troops to Afghanistan. This War has negative effects for Afghanistan as well as America. Economically America is a very rich nation, though they waste a lot of money in this war. Thus, instead of taking care of more important issues such as trying to find the cure to important sicknesses they use more of their money for the war. Of course Afghanistan has many more problem. Their economy is already very low. With America sending troops to Afghanistan more buildings will fall, and they don't have the resources to pay this. Even the people shouldn't have problems, this war is between terrorists and America. Innocent people die of this, which then separates families or ruins years and years of hard labor. In this case even America suffers, many people who work in the army died during this war. Nevertheless I still think that Afghanistan is the one that is affected by this war, during a war people lose all they have, every precious thing is taken away from them. Even the food and water resources get smaller, thus less people can eat and drink properly. Even medicine isn't found easily. Furthermore even hospitals get full, so less people survive. People react too, they want to be safe, they want to have some security. People then decide to rebel, which then affects the government that already has enough problems dealing with this war.
(link of picture is in picture.)