What I have learned from others.

After reading Troy, Austin, and John's blogs, I feel like I have learned something. Troy's blog taught me about how much the subway affected peoples lives and was the best source of public transportation. Austin's blog taught me about how NFL football got started up. Last but most definitely not least, John's blog taught me about electricity and how people used it for leisure back in the day.

The Brooklyn Bridge

(http://egotvonline.com/2011/05/24/cool-bridge-pictures/)

We have been studying about the Age of the City. I picked to write about urban transportation and how it affected people’s leisure time. I had a hard time finding out why the bridge was built until I research about the leisure time of the people that lived in Brooklyn. I found out that people were getting very angry because they were having to travel and hour each way to work everyday in Manhattan. This was a big problem for people because they had better things to do in their time besides riding a ferry for 2 hours out of the day. They would have much rather gone shopping, or played in the park, or just relaxed. Because of this, they decided to build a bridge that connected the cities and reduced the travel time spent traveling from work to their homes.

(http://www.loc.gov/pictures/resource/pan.6a19661/)

After reading The Bourbon News, I learned that there was a toll that people had to pay to go across the bridge. Pedestrian cost was the cheapest and people only had to pay two cents for walking across. The most expensive was two horse trucks or wagons which were thirty cents to cross. This cost was a small price to pay for workers getting to work and back home faster. It also gave them more leisure time, which made people a lot happier.

(http://www.loc.gov/pictures/resource/cph.3c04633/)

I wanted to find out how big of a deal the Brooklyn Bridge was to the people of New York so I looked up some of the New York Times newspapers from the year it began construction. I found out that 432 articles were written about the Brooklyn Bridge in just one year! That is over an article a day! The construction of this bridge was such a huge deal to everyone because it would give them more free time and allow for faster transportation.

(http://www.loc.gov/pictures/resource/cph.3c23007/)

I found out that John A. Roebling, chief engineer of the Brooklyn Bridge, was an emigrant from Prussia! He was one of the best suspension bridge builders in the world and that is why he got the job to build this major bridge. The construction of the bridge started in 1869, sadly though, John A. Roebling died shortly after the construction of the bridge began, so his business partner and son had to take his place as chief engineer.

(http://popartmachine.com/item/pop_art/LOC+1079172/[VIEW-LOOKING-ACROSS-THE-BROOKLYN-BRIDGE,-N.Y.C.-WITH-PEOPLE-WALKING...)

When the bridge was finished in 1883, Emily, John Roebling’s wife, was given the honor to be the first person to travel across completed bridge by carriage. The bridge opened for use on May 24, 1883. This ceremony was also very special because the President of the United States, President Chester Arthur, attended it. I also found out that the previous president, President Garfield, was assassinated the year before, which adds on to the specialness of the ceremony.

Update on how the "not a research paper" is going

I am doing my project on the construction of the Brooklyn Bridge. So far, I have found very little success with anything to do with this project until today at the end of class. At the end of class I finally found a website that has newspapers from way back when the Brooklyn Bridge was being constructed. I can use these as primary sources so I am a very happy camper! I am probably going to look for a book source tomorrow in class.

Halloween vs. Christmas Spending

After doing some research, I found out that Americans are estimated to spend around $5.8 billion on costumes, candy, and decorations this year. Poles were taken and from the 9,000 people that took the survey, the average American will each spend around $60 on Halloween. This is almost an 18% increase from last years sales!

After doing more research, I found that Christmas spending was way more the Halloween spending by an insane amount. This year alone, Americans are estimated to spend a grand total of around $154 billion on gifts! According to the poles, the average that each American will spend on Christmas gifts this year is around $800! This is an 8% increase from last year.

Industrial Supremacy: Question #11

What caused the outbreak of the railroad strike of 1877?

The outbreak of the railroad strike of 1877 began when the eastern railroads announced a 10% wage cut. This soon expanded into something approaching a class war.

A Nation of Immigrants

Being a nation of immigrants is a true honor. To me, being a nation of immigrants means that America is a very special place to live, otherwise people from all around the world would not go through so much to be here. I think that the people that decided to leave their homeland to successfully make a life in this country are both brave and selfless. I believe that they are brave because it can be very scary traveling to a place where you know nobody there, you do not have a job and so you just have to hope for the best, and many times people had to leave loved ones behind. I think that these people are selfless because many of them did not leave so that they would make their lives better, but they left so that they could provide a better future for the generations to come in their families.

These traits have shaped America and its culture because without both of them we might not have been the same great country that we are today. They have shaped America as a country because without the motivation that immigrants had to be successful, it would have not only taken much more time to be as technologically advanced as we are today but it also could have changed who we are today as people. Unfortunately I do not feel a connection to my ancestors. Since I never knew them and they never knew me it can sometimes be hard to feel any real emotions for them, but when I look more into my family tree I hope that I do feel a connection between me and my ancestors.

Faces of America

      The film, Faces of America, was about a man that had found out about some famous people’s ancestor history and wanted to share the information with them and see what they had to say about it. Some of the people were aware of a little bit of their family history already, but many were completely shocked about what they found out. There was a lot of emotion in this film because the people had no idea about the achievements and hardship that their ancestors had been through. Some of them also had no idea just how lucky they were to be where they are in life.

       From watching this film, one might learn how their daily lives are possible because of their ancestors. They could see that people in their families stood up for what they believed in and made a difference. People can also appreciate the sacrifices that their ancestors made it so that their children could have a better future and get a good education so that, hopefully, things would progressively get better as the chain went on. This was a good film to see and it got me interested in learning about my family tree. 

I found out about John D. Rockefeller philanthropy acts here, http://www.rockefellerfoundation.org/who-we-are/our-history/. I learned that John D. Rockefeller started donating money to his Sunday school and church from his first job that he had as a teenager. He was inspired by an essay that Andrew Carnegie, a very wealthy philanthropist, wrote in 1889. Rockefeller wrote back to Andrew Carnegie saying, "The time will come when men of wealth will more generally be willing to use it for the good of others." In the same year Rockefeller worked hard with donating his money and ended up giving $35 million in gifts over 20 years so that the University of Chicago could be founded. As time went on his donations kept getting bigger and bigger and in 1901 he created what is now known as Rockefeller University, which promoted education in the United States.