U.S. history concepts · AP U.S. History
Market Revolution
Market Revolution: The early nineteenth-century transformation of the U.S. economy as transportation, communication and manufacturing tied households to regional and national markets.
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What it means
Between roughly 1815 and 1850, canals such as the Erie Canal, steamboats, railroads and the telegraph cut the cost of moving goods and information. Farmers increasingly grew crops for distant markets, and factories such as the textile mills of Lowell, Massachusetts, drew workers into wage labor.
The Market Revolution reshaped gender roles, class relations and regional economies, and it tied the North's industry and the South's cotton production more closely together.
Example
The Erie Canal, completed in 1825, dramatically lowered the cost of shipping goods between the Great Lakes region and New York City.
On the exam
The Market Revolution is a major Period 4 theme and a common DBQ and LEQ topic about economic and social change.