Vintage Photos Show What the US Looked Like 150 Years Ago

After the Civil War, America entered its Second Industrial Revolution. During this time, cities became the place to find a job as factories popped up in urban areas. This sparked a great change in the family dynamic.

Before this time period, families mostly lived on farmland and made a living off their land. But from 1870 to 1920, millions of people moved to cities.

People crammed into the streets of New York City 150 years ago, crowding the city. This marked the beginning of tenement housing, which packed entire families into one-room apartments. Most lived in squalor and in unsafe environments.  

“It was all very dense, very crowded, and unregulated — conditions that fostered disease and inhumane living conditions,” the New York Public Library reported.

Once the railroads were completed after the Civil War, many people moved out west to settle and farm the open land. While some think of these people as cowboys, the Library of Congress debunked that narrative: The people who moved out west experienced tough lifestyles, including “long, hard hours of labor, poor living conditions, and economic hardship.”

To combat poverty and hardships, many immigrated to the United States in hopes of a better life. From 1870 to 1900, 12 million people immigrated to the country, per the Library of Congress. At that time, the majority of immigrants were coming from Germany, Ireland, and England.

More than 70% of immigrants entered the US via New York City’s Ellis Island.

Slavery had been made illegal in 1865 by the ratification of the 13th Amendment, and, in 1870, the US government passed the 15th Amendment, which granted African Americans the right to vote, although many were still unable to do so due to other discriminatory laws in place.

The 15th Amendment states, “The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.”

Five years later, the Civil Rights Act of 1875 passed, prohibiting discrimination against African Americans in public places, including transportation and accommodations, but it was declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court just eight years later. It took nearly a century for the principles to be passed into law.

Throughout the 1870s and for decades to come, multiple practices were implemented to stop Black people from exercising their right to vote. In some ways, African Americans were free, but in many ways, they were disfranchised.

It would be nearly 100 years before many people of color could exercise their right to vote, with the passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and the Voting Rights Amendments in 1975.

Before 1870, public education was not a priority. But between 1870 and 1900, attendance at public schools doubled, as people saw the value of an educated society. In fact, the growing number of immigrant families in the US prompted the need for public schools as assimilation efforts demanded accessible education for children across the US.

Public schools were often one room and housed children of all ages. Students learned math, reading, writing, geography, and history. 

For families who were extremely poor, children would sometimes forgo schooling and instead join the workforce to help the family’s finances.

Most parents 150 years ago would make toys out of items lying around the house. During this time, rag dolls were popular.

If you were wealthier, however, you would have access to handcrafted toys. Abroad, children played with dolls made of china, train sets, and soldiers. It was also common for children to play with toys that represented a story from the Bible.

In the 1870s, women’s dresses tended to swoop towards the back and bunch around the buttocks, according to the Fashion Institute of Technology. It was also common that the dress fell flat against the abdomen. The princess waistline, which was achieved by wearing a tight corset, was also popular during this time period.

Some men during this time period also used canes or walking sticks as fashion accessories.

By the mid-1870s, traveling by horse and buggy had become the most popular mode of transport worldwide. 

The Spring Wagon is just one model that people used. It was a carriage that had two benches with one behind the other, per Britannica. 

It wouldn’t be until decades later, in 1908, that the Ford Model T popularized automobile transportation.

The first steamboat was launched in 1807, so by 1870, the industry had largely taken off.

“Steamboats dominated American river transportation,” the National Museum of American History wrote.

The upstream and downstream systems allowed people to transport goods and people at a faster and cheaper rate.

Before 1871, 45,000 miles of railroad track had already been laid in the US, but from 1871 to 1900, the country laid another 170,000 miles, according to the Library of Congress. As the transcontinental railroads crisscrossed the US, train travel became popular.

During the 1870s, people were gaining access to foods that weren’t easily accessible in their geographical areas before. People on the East Coast could suddenly consume oranges from California, beef from Wyoming, and fresh milk. 

This led to an expansion in the American diet beyond the previous regional bounds.

Right at the peak of the Gilded Age glamor, 1875 saw the launch of luxury train cars like the Pullman Palace Car Company, which produced high-end rail travel options for the wealthiest passengers.

Grocery stores like Great Atlantic & Pacific Tea Company and the A&P opened in the mid-1800s, and they gained popularity by the 1870s.

Around this time, women started buying mass-produced groceries instead of making their own, and “five and dime” stores also became popular around this time period for the same reason.

About 150 years ago, Aaron Montgomery Ward started a mail-order business by publishing a catalog that featured appliances, furniture, and clothing. It quickly took off and became a popular means of retail for people in the 1870s.

Cycling got its start 150 years ago, but it became a national craze in 1890 when women began using bicycles as a tool to mobilize themselves freely, per the Smithsonian.

People who belonged to the upper and middle classes loved to play tennis and golf.

Lawn tennis, which originated in England, spread in the US throughout the 1870s. The New Orleans Lawn Tennis Club — widely considered the first tennis club in the US — was founded in 1876.

Throughout the US, baseball gained momentum during the 1870s after emerging a few decades earlier in 1846, when the first official baseball game was held in Hoboken, New Jersey.

In 1876, the National League was created by executive and later president of the Chicago White Stockings, William Hulbert.

The Kentucky Derby got its start 150 years ago, in 1875. Today, the sporting event is still held in Louisville, Kentucky, and is considered an American tradition.

Considered “America’s oldest active gun club,” per its website, the Massachusetts Rifle Association was founded in 1875.

Just a few years earlier, in 1871, the National Rifle Association had been founded in New York.

By the late 1890s, shooting competitions began taking off.

By 1875, telecommunications technologies had been developing, with telegrams becoming more popular and efficient since the spread of Morse code messages in the 1840s.

In 1876, Alexander Graham Bell patented the telephone, which allowed people to speak across long distances and revolutionized modern communications.

Founded by the inventor, the Bell Telephone Company eventually became what today is AT&T, per the company’s website.