Chapter 18

Winslow Homer
A novelist of the realist school of literature from the late nineteenth century. As an
illustrator for Harper's Weekly, the first successful mass-circulation magazine in
America, Homer also drew realistic scenes of factories, railroad workers, and other
aspects of industrial life.
William Dean Howells
Author of one of the best-known realist novels, The Rise of Silas Lapham, and editor
of the Atlantic Monthly, one of a handful of influential magazines that championed
literary realism.
Henry James
American novelist who returned to the United States in 1907 after a quarter of a
century in Europe. He was stunned and disgusted by the pervasive presence of
immigrants in New York City who did not share his Protestant, democratic, Englishspeaking background
Walt Whitman
Realist poet and writer who combined popular culture and so-called high art. His
sometimes-erotic imagery was meant to capture the vivid imagery of everyday life.
Nickelodeon
Storefront movie arcades situated in working-class areas of cities. Requiring little
money to found, and showing continuous film performances, they eventually
replaced vaudeville houses as places of entertainment.
Social Darwinism
The combination of social theory and evolutionary science, wherein human
inequality was the outcome of a struggle for survival in which the fittest rose to the
top of the social ladder. This theory made the rich seem more fit than the poor, and
it made blacks seem less fit than whites.
Chapter 19
Henry George
Critic of industrial capitalism who argued for what was called producers ideology,
which started from the assumption that only human labor could create legitimate
wealth.
Frances Willard
Temperance activist who served as president of the Women's Christian Temperance
Union
The Knights of Labor
Inspired by the producers' ideology and admitted everyone from self-employed
farmers to unskilled factory workers, the Knights of Labor advocated a host of

progressive reforms, including the eight-hour day, equal pay for men and women,
the abolition of child and prison labor, inflation of the currency to counteract the
deflationary spiral, and a national income tax.
Populism
A coalition of reform organizations that demanded an inflationary currency policy,
subtreasuries, a graduated income tax, direct government ownership of the railroad
and telegraph industries, and the redistribution of lands owned by the railroads, but
that failed to build alliances across economic and racial lines.
Sherman Anti-Trust Act
An 1890 law that made it illegal for combinations to enter into arrangements that
would restrain competition.
Tammany Hall
New York City political machine that traded basic services for votes, catering mainly
to Irish Catholics.