The period initiated by the Civil War and terminated by the turn of the century was a time of marked growth and change in the United States. Industrialism, a relatively significant factor in the national makeup prior to the war, was greatly stimulated by the event and was by 1900 a dominant force in the country, making its affect felt in all phases of the American experience. During this period of shifting national emphasis, the United States came to know the poverty of the industrial masses and the blight and overcrowding of urban centers sired by the necessity of industry. England, the “mother country,” had begun to experience and deal with these industry fostered evils earlier in the century. There existed, however, a primary difference between the two countries, a difference which would greatly alter the long-range effects on national outlook by what was primarily the same phenomenon. This difference was the American frontier and the accompanying easy accessibility to a new life, possible success, and escape from the dreary gray life of industrial poverty
