The Gilded Age

America's postwar expansion

The rise of the robber barons

Captains of industry

Gilded age politics, reformers, and regulators

The rise of labor

The 1890s : decade of upheaval

Legacy of the gilded age

William Jennings Bryan (1860-1925) : populist leader and three-time Democratic candidate for president

Andrew Carnegie (1835-1919) : steel magnate and philanthropist

Grover Cleveland (1837-1908) : Democratic president of the United States

Eugene V. Debs (1855-1926) : founder of the American Railway Union and the Socialist Party of America

Samuel Gompers (1850-1924) : founder and president of the American Federation of Labor

Jay Gould (1836-1892) : gilded age financier and railroad owner

Mary Elizabeth Lease (1853-1933) : reformist speaker and politician

J.P. Morgan (1837-1913) : leading banker and financier of the gilded age

Terrence V. Powderly (1849-1924) : Leader of the Knights of Labor

John D. Rockefeller (1839-1937) : founder of the Standard Oil Company

Mark Twain describes the get-rich-quick mining culture

The glitter of gilded age high society

Exposing the price-fixing schemes of the "lords of industry"

An anarchist protests his Haymarket death sentence

Andrew Carnegie's "gospel of wealth"

"The problem of the children in New York City

The Sherman Antitrust Act

The populists articulate their principles

William Jennings Bryan's "cross of gold" speech

A second gilded age? : the income gap says yes

A new gilded age? : living standards say no

Important people, places, and terms

Chronology.