Hi, my name is Sam. I’m in Mr. Sal’s pd 3 POD class. For mine and codys project we took 10 pictures each of where we were at on 10-10-10. We did pretty good. We both took the pictures at our designation and we put them together to show what was going on at both places atthe certain times. What I would change for next time is that I would actually turn it in.

Hi this is Rich S. from Mr. Sals period 6 U.S. History class. Businesses in the early 1900s did not provide health care for their workers. Sometimes when a worker was severely injured, they would never be able to work again because their injuries could not be treated properly. The companies did not care for their workers, they were treated cruelly and this began to create public anger due to the irresponsibility of companies.

Hi, my name is Brandon L. from Mr. Salvucci’s pd. 9 20th Century History class.

Information for this blog was found on the following website:  http://books.google.com/books?id=1Zb3-2UxHyUC&pg=PT553&lpg=PT553&dq=problems+of+urban+growth+in+the+early+1900s&source=bl&ots=jWEIZQ0gvt&sig=fiw7dRaJd5fRJwpwXUdmmCENYhM&hl=en&ei=lY-0TKajLMP6lwfGgujHCg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=4&ved=0CBwQ6AEwAw#v=onepage&q&f=false

Information was also obtained from the American Odyssey book.

Urban growth became a problem for the United States in the early 1900s.  People moved into the cities of this country from Europe, trying to find a new life and new jobs.  In the United States people also moved up north from the rural south in search of jobs.  This caused overcrowding in the cities and buildings in the cities.  There wasn’t enough room for people to live.  They crammed families and relatives into small, one room apartments and the living conditions were bad.  It was overcrowded and unsanitary.

The living conditions were bad for the newcomers to the city, but it was worse for African Americans.  Because of the prejudice towards African Americans, they were forced to live in the smallest areas of the city in the worst apartments where the  living conditions were horrible and overcrowded.

It was also dangerous if there were fires in the buildings because they did not have any safety regulations at that time.  People didn’t have fire escapes or routes to go when there was a fire and many people would die when they panicked and couldn’t get out on time.  Many people also died from smoke inhalation because they may have been asleep when a fire occurred and since there weren’t any smoke alarms, they didn’t even know there was a fire.

As so many cities grew, so did violence.   The murder rate had increased from 1.2% to 6.8% per 100,000 people.  This occurred because many jobs that people got did not pay well at all.  The people were poor and had to supplement their income.  The problem was, the way they did it was  illegal.  People resorted to gambling, robbery and extortion to try to get more money to take care of their families.  Women turned to prostitution.  There were cocaine addicts, etc.  As the cities grew, so did the rate of violence.

One thing they tried to do to fix the overcrowded buildings, was architects designed a new kind of building called a dumbell apartment.  They were narrower in the middle than on the ends like the letter “I”.  They were built like that to let more air and light into the buildings, but the people who lived there would throw garbage out the windows and the sun would rot the grabage.   The smell would be so bad and they had to shut the windows.   It was not good for the people to live in these conditions because the disease germs that thrived in the garbage could be spread to the people.

The African  Americans could not get a job because there was so much prejudice in the north against them.  This left them poor and there was no jobs for them to work. They had to live in poor conditions because there was nowhere for the African  Americans  to go.

People who tried to fix the problems of the poor people living in the terrible conditions of tenement apartments or worse were mostly the muckrakers.  These are the people who wrote about the plight of the poor to bring it to the attention of the general public.  They would write for the newspapers, magazines and they would write books.  One of the people who wrote a book was named Upton Sinclair.  He tried to write  about the exploitations of workers in the United States by actually living with them in Chicago for seven weeks.  Because he wrote about what he saw, and published it, many people became angry when they read it and demanded change to be made.  Because Upton Sinclair made all of this information public, people got together and complained to the government demanding that changes be made.  Although change came slow, change did happen, thanks to Upton Sinclair and the rest of the muckrakers.

Hello my name is ransom m. I am in Mr.Sal’s peroisd nine class. Immigration had and has a lot to do with current society. Immigration can be define as attracting people from other countries to live there. The defination shows up in history, when the 25 million immigrants came to America between 1880 to 1920. It also shows again when between the time period of 1890 to 1920 there were 80 percent came from southern Europe. But the problem was that the government was trying to fix it they had so many things happening at once. For example they had immagration with an increase in crime rate and world war one. To focus one issue at a time. In the end tackling one issue at a time did work but took a while. Another way to fix the immagration is to make suburbs, and move the people away from the big city.

Hi this is Nick c. from Mr. Sals period 6 class. There is a very important issue I want to discuss, food safety, food safety is a big issue that doesn’t really take a whole lot of actions to prevent the things that make food safe. In the 20th century child labor was in full swing and in meat packing plants children were working and sometimes children didn’t come home because they fell in the meat processor and were made into burgers and hot dogs. And since the age of meat packing plants being unclean the plants started cleaning up and now they have USDA inspected meat, USDA choice, and such other cuts that are all beef and not other things.
Like most Americans, you probably heard the stories of people losing their fingers and limbs and instead of shutting down production the meat packing plants would keep making hot dogs, and hamburgers. Now production would stop the whole batch would be thrown out and the whole place would be sanitized and clean. But back then they didn’t care rats and other vermin would be put in the meat as fillers and Americans would eat them unknowingly. That is why the USDA was formed, to keep meat safe clean.

Hi its Danielle W from period one. Child labor is a form of labor preformed by young people at a young age. Although child labor is not illegal everywhere it is frowned upon in many countries. In the 19th century child labor was because of mainly the industrial revolution, families could not support themselves, and the rise of immigration. Now in the 20th century the main cause is the lack of family income and the desire to have the money.
Both in the 19th century and the 20th century child labor is a severe problem. The enforcement of young kids working is mostly a problem in Europe, asia, and south america. Throughout the ears child labor has been brought to the attention of people aroundthe world and is currently trying to be stopped. Children should not have to work till a certain age and unless they are willing to do so.

Hey I’m Morgan from Mr. Sal’s 20th century period 1. Immigration was a big problem in the 1900’s and still is today. First of all it was causing a huge overflow of people in the US. This takes away jobs and space. Also there were many differant types of people which causes alot of fights. The government tried to fix this issue by creating green cards. It works because it limits the amount of people coming to the US. Although immigration is still a problem it is not as bad as it used to be.

I am Ashley S. in Mr. Sal’s 6th period class. In the 1800’s women weren’t given as many rights as men were. No matter what kind of family you lived in whether urban or rural you still had more respnsibility for children than men did. Women were very upset with child labor because young children were working in factories. Kids who worked in paint factories inhaled toxic arsenic fumes and children that worked in clothing factories suffered spinal curvature from hunching over sewing machines. Women weren’t aloud to do many things like voting. Women mainly only took care of the children. Florence Kelley tried to fix the child labor rules. She went to college at Cornell University in New York and then went to graduate school in Switzerland. She pressed the federal government to outlaw child labor but it did not work. She continued her work to try to get rid of child labor but it never worked.

Hello my name is Jessica K. from Mr. Sal’s 20th century class. I am going to be talking about the limiting work days in the United States. I will be talking about the weekly maximum working hours, opting-out of the 48 hour week, and who tried to fix the issue.

The average work day is 48 hours, and no adult HAS to work more than that. The 48 hours are normally over a period of 17 weeks. You can work over the average 48 hours a week as long as it averages over 17 weeks and is less than 48 hours per week.

If you are 18 years of age and wish to work more than 48 hours, you choose to opt-out of the 48 hour limit, and must be voluntary or in writing. You should not be sacked or unfairly treated if you do not sign an opt-out. Just remember you can always cancel you opt-out agreement whenever you want.

In November 2002 the 80 hour work limit went into effect in residencies by the American Osteopathic Association. It past but there was a lot of other things involved like, the trainee shall have on alternate weeks 48 hours periods off, or at least one 24 hour period off each week, averaged over a 4 week period.