Technological Transformation
Throughout history, technological advances have always altered society. Elizabeth Schwartz Cowan argues in her book A Social History of American Technology that from the earliest times, technology has had significant impact on the social, economic and political makeup. This is not a new phenomenon that started with computers. For example, mass production, transportation and especially communications have greatly impacted the world. The Industrial Revolution, first originating in Great Britain, quickly was accepted in the U.S. where it "flourished and took a significant new shape" (Pursell 87) and became the "American system of manufacturers." The whole purpose of this system was to transfer the product from the workers to the machines. Specialized machines could much more rapidly and efficiently mass produce parts used for such consumer goods as sewing machines, bicycles and typewriters. One thinks of Henry Ford's assembly line when regarding mass production, but Pursell (91) explains that "More than any other product, it was the bicycle that forged the link between early-nineteenth-century armory practice and early-twentieth-century mass production." In the 1890s, one company, alone, was producing 60,000 bikes a year.
Increasing numbers of people began living in the cities instead of on farms. After the Civil War, "city residents began to flex their political muscles and to express their political interests more successfully" (ibid 166). Socially, it drew people together, economically it grew huge conglomerates and politically, it offered individuals another way to reach their constituents. Hired help, as a domestic servant was called, had been a traditional worker in New England local communities. According to Wilentz (79), domestic service was also transformed. , more than anywhere else in the world (Cowan 117). As Pursell states, "The spread of television provided a striking example of the cultural, technological and economic nexus of postwar communications development" (296). For example, by 1860, hundreds of American railroad companies were operating 30,600 miles of railroad track in the U. However, people still had to physically go somewhere to talk with someone to order products or say hello. The computer had been used during WWII, but was just in its infancy at this time. However, with communication, it was possible to go from one place to another without any physical movement. a social standpoint, Americans started to become dependent on these machines that made life easier. Great cities like Chicago grew large and prosperous because of its presence; whereas others, now unknown, died because the gift of rails was withheld (81). As time went on, the communications connected the United States with other industrialized world countries.
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