{"id":206,"date":"2015-01-14T17:45:15","date_gmt":"2015-01-14T17:45:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/hist-118pinsker\/?page_id=206"},"modified":"2017-01-25T16:37:01","modified_gmt":"2017-01-25T16:37:01","slug":"1870s-reconstruction","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/hist-118pinsker\/timeline\/1870s-reconstruction\/","title":{"rendered":"1870s– Reconstruction"},"content":{"rendered":"

Overview<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Booker<\/a><\/p>\n

The term “Reconstruction” has more than one meaning in American history. \u00a0Usually it refers to the period from 1863 to 1877, as the federal government worked to “reconstruct” or “restore” former Confederate states back in the national system of political representation. \u00a0This was a controversial effort that often pitted the major political parties and the federal branches against each other,\u00a0but ultimately all of the former rebel states returned to their place within the union. \u00a0During the 1870s, however, the idea of a reconstructed nation meant more than just a restoration of southern participation in the government. \u00a0It also meant a reconstructed society, not only in the South but also in the North, one that now included free blacks and whites living and often voting together. \u00a0That also proved controversial and quite difficult. \u00a0When he was 16-years-old, former Virginia slave Booker T. Washington<\/a> traveled over 500 miles, mostly by foot, in order\u00a0to receive an education at the Hampton Institute, one of several schools established for the freed people during the era of Reconstruction. \u00a0In chapter 3 of his memoir,\u00a0Up From Slavery,\u00a0<\/em>Washington recounts his penniless arrival in Richmond on his way to Hampton. \u00a0In one of the most memorable scenes in American literature, he describes how he “crept under the sidewalk”<\/a> and slept outside on his first night, exhausted and hungry, but still hopeful that he could “reconstruct” his life with a real education. \u00a0 After much hard work, Washington succeeded, but he still acknowledged the challenges that loomed so large in the 1870s, such as what he called the “Ku Klux period,”<\/a> which he considered, “the darkest part of the Reconstruction days.”<\/a>\u00a0 \u00a0Beyond race, there were also major disruptions and changes in American society during the 1870s involving the economy, landscape and society at large. \u00a0Greed and corruption seemed rampant. \u00a0Political and social tensions that had been held back\u00a0somewhat during the Civil War now exploded into the public consciousness and for many defined a decade that was as fast-paced and turbulent\u00a0as any in their lifetime. \u00a0Mark Twain famously labeled this era, “The Gilded Age,”<\/a> in his satirical “Tale of Today,” a novel written in 1873 with Charles Dudley Warner.<\/p>\n

Online Textbook Resources<\/strong><\/p>\n

Reconstruction from Digital History<\/a> (Mintz and McNeil)<\/p>\n

Gilded Age from Digital History<\/a> (Mintz and McNeil)<\/p>\n

Selected Timelines<\/strong><\/p>\n

American Literature and Events: 1870s<\/a> (Donna Campbell, Washington State)<\/p>\n

1870s<\/a>\u00a0(Henry Ford Museum)<\/p>\n

Featured Videos<\/strong><\/p>\n

Historian H.W. Brands offers an overview of the Gilded Age\u00a0through profiles of three capitalists: \u00a0John Rockefeller, Andrew Carnegie, and J.P. Morgan, in this hour-long videotaped lecture. \u00a0Social studies teacher Tim Betts provides a somewhat shorter and snappier summary of the same information in a music video parody called “Robber Barons.”<\/p>\n