Pittsburgh Rising: From Frontier Town to Steel City, 1750-1920 - Hardcover

Muller, Edward K.; Ruck, Rob

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0822947722 ISBN 13: 9780822947721

Publisher: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2023

Synopsis

Over 170 years, Pittsburgh rose from remote outpost to industrial powerhouse. With the formation of the United States, the frontier town located at the confluence of three rivers grew into the linchpin for trade and migration between established eastern cities and the growing settlements of the Ohio Valley. Resources, geography, innovation, and personalities led to successful glass, iron, and eventually steel operations. As Pittsburgh blossomed into one of the largest cities in the country and became a center of industry, it generated great wealth for industrial and banking leaders. But immigrants and African American migrants, who labored under insecure, poorly paid, and dangerous conditions, did not share in the rewards of growth. Pittsburgh Rising traces the lives of individuals and families who lived and worked in this early industrial city, jammed into unhealthy housing in overcrowded neighborhoods near the mills. Although workers organized labor unions to improve conditions and charitable groups and reform organizations, often helmed by women, mitigated some of the deplorable conditions, authors Muller and Ruck show that divides along class, religious, ethnic, and racial lines weakened the efforts to improve the inequalities of early twentieth-century Pittsburgh - and persist today.

About this title

About the Author

Edward K. Muller is emeritus professor of history at the University of Pittsburgh, where he was a former chair of the Department of History, former director of the urban studies program, and a Fulbright Research Scholar in New Zealand. He is foundi

Edition details

• Publisher: University of Pittsburgh Press
• Publication date: 2023
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0822947722
• ISBN 13: 9780822947721
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 296