View source for American urban history

{{History of the United States|image= File:400 Broadway.jpg|imagesize= 250px |caption= [[St. Louis, Missouri]] c.1900}}
'''American urban history''' is the study of cities of the United States. [[Local history|Local historians]] have always written about their own cities. Starting in the 1920s, and led by [[Arthur Schlesinger, Sr.]] at Harvard, professional historians began comparative analysis of what cities have in common, and started using theoretical models and scholarly biographies of specific cities.<ref>Michael Frisch,  "American urban history as an example of recent historiography." ''History and Theory'' (1979): 350-377. [https://www.jstor.org/stable/2504535 in JSTOR]</ref><ref>
[https://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=2344 Online review by  Andrea Tuttle Kornbluh  1998.]</ref>  The United States has also had a long history of hostility to the city, as characterized for example by [[Thomas Jefferson]]'s [[History of agrarianism|agrarianism]] and the [[People's Party (United States)|Populist movement]] of the 1890s.<ref>Steven Conn, ''Americans Against the City: Anti-Urbanism in the Twentieth Century'' (2014)</ref>  Mary Sies (2003) argues:
{{blockquote|At the start of the twenty-first century, North American urban history is flourishing. Compared to twenty-five years ago, the field has become more interdisciplinary and intellectually invigorating.  Scholars are publishing increasingly sophisticated efforts to understand how the city as space intersects the urbanization process, as well as studies that recognize the full complexity of experiences for different metropolitan cohorts.<ref>{{cite journal|first = Mary Corbin |last = Sies|title = North American Urban History: The Everyday Politics and Spatial Logics of Metropolitan Life|journal = Urban History Review|volume = 32|number =1 |date =2003|pages = 28–42| doi=10.7202/1015740ar |url = https://www.erudit.org/revue/uhr/2003/v32/n1/1015740ar.pdf }}</ref>}}

== Historiography  ==
[[File:Arthur M. Schlesinger (Sr.), Ohio State University Monthly.jpg|thumb|Arthur Schlesinger Sr.]]American urban history is a branch of the [[history of the United States]] and of the broader field of [[Urban history]]. That field of history examines the historical development of cities and towns, and the process of [[urbanization]]. The approach is often multidisciplinary, crossing boundaries into fields like [[social history]], [[architectural history]], [[urban sociology]], [[urban geography]], [[business history]], and even [[archaeology]]. [[Urbanization]] and [[industrialization]] were popular themes for 20th-century historians, often tied to an implicit model of [[modernization]], or the transformation of rural traditional societies.

In the United States from the 1920s to the 1990s many influential monographs began as one of the 140 PhD dissertations at Harvard University directed by [[Arthur M. Schlesinger Sr.]] (1888–1965) or [[Oscar Handlin]] (1915–2011).<ref>Bruce M. Stave, ed., ''The Making of Urban History: Historiography through Oral History'' (1977) [https://books.google.com/books?isbn=0803908687 in Google]</ref><ref>Terrence J. McDonald, "Theory and Practice in the 'New' History: Rereading Arthur Meier Schlesinger's The Rise of the City, 1878–1898," ''Reviews in American History'' (1992) 20#3 pp. 432–445 [https://www.jstor.org/stable/2703171 in JSTOR]</ref>  Schlesinger and his students took a group approach to history, sharply playing down the role of individuals. Handlin added a focus on groups defined by ethnicity (that is Germans, Irish, Jews, Italians Hispanics etc.) or by class (working class or middle class). The Harvard model was that the urban environment, including the interaction with other groups, shaped their history and group outlook.<ref>Zane L. Miller,  "The Crisis of Civic and Political Virtue: Urban History, Urban Life and the New Understanding of the City." ''Reviews in American History'' 24.3 (1996) pp. 361–368. [https://muse.jhu.edu/journals/reviews_in_american_history/v024/24.3miller.html online]</ref>

=== New urban history ===
The "new urban history" was a short-lived movement that attracted a great deal of attention In the 1960s, then quickly disappeared.<ref>Stephan Thernstrom and Richard Sennett, eds., ''Nineteenth-century Cities: Essays in the New Urban History'' (1970)</ref> It used statistical methods and innovative computer techniques to analyze manuscript census data, person by person, focusing especially on the geographical and social mobility of random samples of residents. Numerous monographs appeared, but it proved frustrating to interpret the results. Historian [[Stephan Thernstrom]], the leading promoter of the new approach, soon disavowed it, saying it was neither new nor urban nor history.<ref>Eric H. Monkkonen, ''America Becomes Urban: The Development of U.S. Cities and Towns, 1780–1980'' (1988) pp. 26–27</ref>

Overall urban history grew rapidly in the 1970s and 1980s, stimulated by the surge of interest in social history.<ref>Raymond A. Mohl, "The History of the American City," in William H. Cartwright and Richard L. Watson Jr. eds., ''Reinterpretation of American History and Culture'' (1973)  pp. 165–205</ref>  Since the 1990s, however, the field has been aging and has had much less attraction to younger scholars.<ref>{{cite book|author=Thomas Bender|title=Intellect and Public Life: Essays on the Social History of Academic Intellectuals in the United States|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=240iKp_jVjoC&pg=PR11|year=1997|publisher=Johns Hopkins University Press|page=11|quote= urban history, a field marked by deep decline in historiographical significance|isbn=9780801857843}}</ref>

=== Claims for urban impact ===
Historian [[Richard Clement Wade|Richard Wade]] has summarized the claims that scholars have made for the importance of the city in American history. The cities were the focal points for the growth of the West, especially those along the Ohio and Mississippi rivers. The cities, especially Boston, were the seed beds of the American Revolution.  Rivalry between cities, such as between Baltimore and Philadelphia, or between Chicago and St. Louis, stimulated economic innovations and growth, especially regarding the railroads.  The cities sponsored [[entrepreneurship]], especially in terms of export and import markets, banking, finance, and the rise of the [[factory system]] after 1812.  The rapidly growing railroad system after 1840 was primarily oriented toward linking together the major cities, which in turn became centers of the wholesale trade.  The railroads allowed major cities such as Atlanta, Chicago, Minneapolis, Denver, and San Francisco to dominate ever-larger [[hinterland]]s.

The failure of the South to develop an urban infrastructure significantly weakened it during the Civil War, especially as its border cities of Baltimore, Washington, Louisville, and St. Louis, refused to join the Confederacy.  The cities were fonts of innovation in democracy, especially in terms of building powerful political organizations and [[political machine|machines]]; they were also the main base for reformers of those machines.  They became the home base for important immigrant groups, especially the Irish and the Jews.  Cities were the strongholds of labor unions in the 19th and 20th centuries (although no longer so in the 21st century).<ref>Richard Wade, "The City in History: Some American Perspectives", in Werner Z. Hirsch, ed., ''Urban Life and Form'' (1963) pp. 59–77</ref>

Historian Zane Miller argues that urban history was rejuvenated in mid-20th century by the realization that the cultural importance of the city went far beyond art galleries and museums. Historians began to emphasize "the importance of individual choices in the past and made the advocacy of lifestyle choices a hallmark of American civilization."  It was the diversity of the city, and the support it provided for diverse lifestyles, that set it so dramatically apart from towns and rural areas.<ref>Miller, "The Crisis of Civic and Political Virtue: Urban History, Urban Life and the New Understanding of the City."</ref> By the 1990s there was increased emphasis on racial minorities, outcasts, and gays and lesbians, as well as studies of leisure activities and sports history.<ref>George Chauncey, ''[[Gay New York: Gender, Urban Culture, and the Making of the Gay Male World, 1890–1940]]'' (1994)</ref><ref>Steven A. Riess, ''City games: The evolution of American urban society and the rise of sports'' (1991).</ref>

===Intellectuals against the city===
As Morton White demonstrated in ''The Intellectual versus the City: from Thomas Jefferson to Frank Lloyd Wright'' (1962), the overwhelming consensus of American intellectuals has been hostile to the city. The main idea is the Romantic view that the unspoiled nature of rural America is morally superior  to the over civilized cities, which are the natural homes of sharpsters and criminals. American poets did not rhapsodize over the cities. On the contrary they portrayed the metropolis as the ugly scene of economic inequality, crime, drunkenness, prostitution and every variety of immorality. Urbanites were set to rhyme as crafty, overly competitive, artificial, and as having lost too much naturalness and goodness.<ref>Robert H. Walker, "The Poet and the Rise of the City". ''Mississippi Valley Historical Review'' (1962): 85–99. [https://www.jstor.org/stable/1889467 in JSTOR]</ref><ref>See also Morton White and Lucia White, "The American intellectual versus the American city." ''Daedalus'' 90.1 (1961): 166-179 
[https://www.jstor.org/stable/20026646 online]</ref>

== Colonial era and American Revolution ==
[[File:View of New Archangel, 1837.tif|thumb|380px| The capital of the [[Russian-American Company]] at New Archangel, present day [[Sitka, Alaska]], 1837]]

Historian [[Carl Bridenbaugh]] examined in depth five key cities: Boston (population 16,000 in 1760); Newport, Rhode Island (population 7500); New York City (population 18,000), Philadelphia (population 23,000); and Charles Town (Charlestown, South Carolina), (population 8000). He argues they grew from small villages to take major leadership roles in promoting trade, land speculation, immigration, and prosperity, and in disseminating the ideas of the Enlightenment, and new methods in medicine and technology. They sponsored a consumer taste for English amenities, developed a distinctly American educational system, and began systems for care of people meeting welfare.<ref>Carl Bridenbaugh, ''Cities in the Wilderness-The First Century of Urban Life in America 1625-1742'' (1938) [https://www.questia.com/library/7916885/cities-in-the-wilderness-the-first-century-of-urban online edition]</ref>

The cities were not remarkable by European standards, but they did display certain distinctly American characteristics, according to Bridenbaugh. There was no aristocracy or established church, there was no long tradition of powerful guilds. The colonial governments were much less powerful and intrusive than corresponding national governments in Europe. They experimented with new methods to raise revenue, build infrastructure and to solve urban problems.<ref>Carl Bridenbaugh, ''Cities in the Wilderness-The First Century of Urban Life in America 1625-1742'' (1938) [https://www.questia.com/library/7916885/cities-in-the-wilderness-the-first-century-of-urban online edition]</ref>

They were more democratic than European cities, in that a large fraction of the men could vote, and class lines were more fluid.  Contrasted to Europe, printers, especially as newspaper editors, had a much larger role in shaping public opinion, and lawyers moved easily back and forth between politics and their profession. Bridenbaugh argues that by the mid-18th century, the middle-class businessmen, professionals, and skilled artisans dominated the cities. He characterizes them as "sensible, shrewd, frugal, ostentatiously moral, generally honest," public spirited, and upwardly mobile, and argues their economic strivings led to "democratic yearnings" for political power.<ref>Carl Bridenbaugh, ''Cities in Revolt: Urban Life in America, 1743-1776'' (1955), pp 147, 332</ref><ref>Benjamin L. Carp, "Cities in review,"  ''Common-Place'' (July 2003) 3#4 [https://www.common-place.org/vol-03/no-04/reviews/carp.shtml online] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150315142529/https://www.common-place.org/vol-03/no-04/reviews/carp.shtml |date=2015-03-15 }}</ref>

Colonial powers established villages of a few hundred population as administrative centers, providing a governmental presence, as well has trading opportunities, and some transportation facilities. Representative examples include Spanish towns of [[Santa Fe, New Mexico]], [[San Antonio]], and [[Los Angeles]], French towns of [[New Orleans]] and [[Detroit]]; Dutch towns of [[New Amsterdam]] (New York City), and the Russian town of [[Sitka, Alaska|New Archangel]] (now Sitka).  When their territory was absorbed into the United States, these towns expanded their administrative roles.<ref>Jacob Ernest Cooke, ed., ''Encyclopedia of the North American colonies'' (1993) 1: 113–154, 233–244.</ref>
Numerous historians have explored the roles of working-class men, including slaves, in the economy of the colonial cities,<ref>[[Seth Rockman]], "Work in the Cities of Colonial British North America," ''Journal of Urban History'' (2007) 33#6 pp. 102–1032</ref> and in the early Republic.<ref>Seth Rockman, "Class and the History of Working People in the Early Republic." ''Journal of the Early Republic'' (2005) 25#4 pp. 527–535. [https://muse.jhu.edu/journals/jer/summary/v025/25.4rockman.html online]</ref>

There were few cities in the entire South, and Charleston (Charles Town) and New Orleans were the most important before the Civil War. The colony of South Carolina was settled mainly by [[Planter (American South)|planters]] from the overpopulated [[Sugar plantations in the Caribbean|sugar]] island colony of [[Barbados]], who brought large numbers of African slaves from that island.<ref>Peter Wood, ''Origins of American Slavery'' (1997), pp. 64–65.</ref>  As Charleston grew as a port for the shipment of rice and later cotton, so did the community's cultural and social opportunities. The city had a large base of elite merchants and rich planters.<ref>Walter J. Fraser, ''Charleston! Charleston!: The History of a Southern City'' (1991)</ref>

The first theater building in America was built in Charleston in 1736, but was later replaced by the 19th-century Planter's Hotel where wealthy planters stayed during Charleston's horse-racing season, now the Dock Street Theatre, known as one of the oldest active theaters built for stage performance in the United States.  Benevolent societies were formed by several different ethnic groups: the South Carolina Society, founded by French [[Huguenot]]s in 1737, the German Friendly Society, founded in 1766, and the Hibernian Society, founded by Irish immigrants in 1801.<ref>Walter J. Fraser, ''Charleston! Charleston!: The History of a Southern City'' (1991)</ref>

The [[Charleston Library Society]] was established in 1748 by some wealthy Charlestonians who wished to keep up with the scientific and philosophical issues of the day. This group also helped establish the [[College of Charleston]] in 1770, the oldest college in South Carolina, the oldest municipal college in the United States, and the 13th oldest college in the United States.<ref>Walter J. Fraser, ''Charleston! Charleston!: The History of a Southern City'' (1991)</ref>

By the 1775 the largest city was Philadelphia at 40,000, followed by New York (25,000), Boston (16,000), Charleston (12,000), and Newport (11,000), along with Baltimore, Norfolk, and Providence, with 6000, 6000, and 4400 population. They too were all seaports and on any one day each hosted a large transient population of Sailors and visiting businessmen. On the eve of the Revolution, 95 percent of the American population lived outside the cities—much to the frustration of the British, who were able to capture the cities with their Royal Navy, but lacked the manpower to occupy and subdue the countryside. In explaining the importance of the cities in shaping the American Revolution, Benjamin Carp compares the important role of waterfront workers, taverns, churches, kinship networks, and local politics.<ref>Benjamin L. Carp, ''Rebels Rising: Cities and the American Revolution'' (2007) [https://www.questia.com/library/120077070/rebels-rising-cities-and-the-american-revolution online edition]</ref>

Historian [[Gary B. Nash]] emphasizes the role of the working class, and their distrust of their betters, in northern ports. He argues that working class artisans and skilled craftsmen made up a radical element in Philadelphia that took control of the city starting about 1770 and promoted a radical Democratic form of government during the revolution. They held power for a while, and used their control of the local militia disseminate their ideology to the working class and to stay in power until the businessmen staged a conservative counterrevolution.<ref>Gary B. Nash, ''The Urban Crucible: The Northern Seaports and the Origins of the American Revolution'' (2nd ed. 1986) pp. 240–47; the first edition of 1979 was entitled ''Urban Crucible: Social Change, Political Consciousness, and the Origins of the American Revolution)''</ref>

== The new nation, 1783–1815 ==
[[File:GROWTH1850.JPG|thumb|350px|Trends in economic growth, 1700–1850]]

The cities played a major role in fomenting the American Revolution, but they were hard hit during the war itself, 1775–83. They lost their main role as oceanic ports, because of the blockade by the British Navy.  Furthermore, the British occupied the cities, especially New York 1776–83, as well as Boston, Philadelphia and Charleston for briefer periods.  During the occupations cities were cut off from their hinterland trade and from overland communication. The British departed in 1783, they took out large numbers of wealthy merchants, resuming their business activities elsewhere in the British Empire.<ref>Robert A. East, "The Business Entrepreneur in a Changing Colonial Economy, 1763–1795", ''Journal of Economic History''  (May, 1946), Vol. 6, Supplement pp. 16–27 [https://www.jstor.org/stable/2113072 in JSTOR]</ref>

The older cities restored their economic basis. Growing cities included Salem, Massachusetts (which opened a new trade with China), New London, Connecticut, and especially Baltimore, Maryland.  The Washington administration under the leadership of Secretary of the treasury Alexander Hamilton set up a national bank in 1791, and local banks began to flourish in all the cities. Merchant entrepreneurship flourished and was a powerful engine of prosperity in the cities.<ref>Robert A. East, "The Business Entrepreneur in a Changing Colonial Economy, 1763–1795", ''Journal of Economic History''  (May, 1946), Vol. 6, Supplement pp. 16–27 [https://www.jstor.org/stable/2113072 in JSTOR]</ref>

Merchants and financiers of the cities were especially sensitive to the weakness of the old Confederation system. When it came time to ratify the much stronger new Constitution in 1788, all the nation's cities, North and South, voted in favor, while the rural districts were divided.<ref>Richard C. Wade, "An Agenda for Urban History", in Herbert J. Bass, ed., ''The State of American History'' (1970) pp. 58–59</ref>

The national capital was at Philadelphia until 1800, when it was moved to Washington. Apart from the murderous Yellow Fever epidemic of 1793, which killed about 10 percent of the population, Philadelphia had a marvelous reputation as the "cleanest, best-governed, healthiest, and most elegant of American cities." Washington, built in a fever-ridden swamp with long hot miserable summers, was ranked far behind Philadelphia, although it did escape [[yellow fever]].<ref>Russel Blaine Nye, ''The Cultural Life of the New Nation: 1776–1830'' (1960) pp. 127–28</ref>

World peace only lasted a decade, for in 1793 a two-decade-long war between Britain and France and their allies broke out.  As the leading neutral trading partner the United States did business with both sides. France resented it, and the [[Quasi-War]] of 1798–99 disrupted trade. Outraged at British impositions on American merchant ships, and sailors, the Jefferson and Madison administrations engaged in economic warfare with Britain [[Embargo of 1807|1807–1812]], and then [[War of 1812|full-scale warfare 1812 to 1815]]. The result was additional serious damage to the mercantile interests.<ref>Curtis P. Nettles, ''The Emergence of a National Economy, 1775–1815'' (1962) remains the best economic overview.</ref><ref>John Allen Krout and Dixon Ryan Fox, ''The Completion of Independence, 1790–1830'' (1944) is a wide-ranging social history of the new nation; see pp. 1–73</ref>

Not all was gloomy in urban history, however. Although there was relatively little immigration from Europe,  the [[American frontier|rapid expansion of settlements]] to the West, and the [[Louisiana Purchase]] of 1803, open up vast frontier lands. New Orleans and St. Louis joined the United States, and entirely new cities were opened in Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, Nashville and points west.  Historian Richard Wade has emphasized the importance of the new cities in the Westward expansion in settlement of the farmlands. They were the transportation centers, and nodes for migration and financing of the westward expansion.<ref>Richard C. Wade, ''The urban frontier: pioneer life in early Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, Lexington, Louisville, and St. Louis'' (1959).</ref>

The newly opened regions had few roads, but a very good river system in which everything flowed downstream to New Orleans. With the coming of the steamboat after 1820, it became possible to move merchandise imported from the Northeast and from Europe upstream to new settlements. The opening of the [[Erie Canal]] made Buffalo the jumping off point for the lake transportation system that made important cities out of Cleveland, Detroit, and especially Chicago.<ref>Richard C. Wade, ''The urban frontier: pioneer life in early Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, Lexington, Louisville, and St. Louis'' (1959).</ref>

== The first stage of rapid urban growth, 1815–1860==
{| class="wikitable sortable"
!City 
!1820
!1840
!1860

|-
| Boston and its suburbs || 63,000 || 124,000 || 289,000
|-
| New York || 152,000 || 391,000 || 1,175,000
|-
| Philadelphia || 137,000 || 258,000 || 566,000
|}
<ref>The totals include suburbs, which were small except in the case of Boston. "George Rogers Taylor, "The Beginnings of Mass Transportation in Urban America: Part 1," ''Smithsonian Journal of History'' (1966) 1:36</ref>

[[History of New York City (1784–1854)|New York]], with a population of 96,000 in 1810 surged far beyond its rivals, reaching a population of 1,080,000 in 1860, compared to 566,000 in Philadelphia, 212,000 in Baltimore, 178,000 in Boston (289,000 including the Boston suburbs), and 169,000 in New Orleans.<ref>George Rogers Taylor, ''The transportation revolution, 1815-1860'' (1951) pp 388-89.</ref>  Historian Robert Albion identifies four aggressive moves by New York entrepreneurs and politicians that helped it jump to the top of American cities. It set up an auction system that efficiently and rapidly sold imported cargoes; it organized a regular transatlantic packet service to England; it built a large-scale coastwise trade, especially one that brought Southern cotton to New York for reexport to Europe; it sponsored the Erie Canal, which opened a large new market in upstate New York and the Old Northwest.<ref>Robert G. Albion, "New York Port and its disappointed rivals, 1815-1860." ''Journal of Business and Economic History'' (1931) 3: 602-629.</ref>

The main rivals, Boston, Philadelphia, and Baltimore, tried to compete with the Erie Canal by opening their own networks of canals and railroads; they never caught up.<ref>Julius Rubin, "Canal or railroad? Imitation and innovation in the response to the Erie canal in Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Boston." ''Transactions of the American Philosophical Society'' (1961): 1-106.</ref>  The opening of the [[Erie Canal]] made Buffalo the jumping off point for the lake transportation system that made important cities out of Cleveland, Detroit, and especially Chicago.<ref>Lawrence V. Roth, "The Growth of American Cities." ''Geographical Review'' (1918) 5#5 pp: 384-398. [https://www.jstor.org/stable/207468 in JSTOR]</ref>   Manufacturing was not a major factor in the growth of the largest cities at this point. Instead  factories were chiefly being built in towns and smaller cities, especially in New England, having waterfalls or fast rivers that were harnessed to generate the power, or were closer to coal supplies, as in Pennsylvania.

===National leadership===
America's financial, business and cultural leadership, that is, literature, the arts, and the media, were concentrated in the three or four largest cities. Political leadership was never concentrated. It was divided between Washington and the state capitals, and many states deliberately moved their state capital out of their largest city, including New York, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Illinois, Missouri, South Carolina, Louisiana, Texas and California.<ref>Christian Montès, ''American Capitals: A Historical Geography'' (2014) &</ref>

Academic and scientific leadership was weak in the United States until the late 19th century, when it began to be concentrated in universities. A few major research-oriented schools were in or close by the largest cities, such as [[Harvard University|Harvard]] (Boston),  [[Columbia University|Columbia]] (New York), [[University of Pennsylvania]] (Philadelphia), [[Johns Hopkins University|Johns Hopkins]] (Baltimore) and [[Chicago]]. However,  most were located in smaller cities or large towns such as Yale in New Haven, Connecticut; Cornell in Ithaca, New York; Princeton in Princeton, New Jersey; the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor; University of Illinois in Urbana; University of Wisconsin in Madison;  University of California in Berkeley, and Stanford in the village of Stanford, California.<ref>Arthur Meier Schlesinger, ''The Rise of the City: 1878-1898'' (1933) pp 82-87, 212-16, 247-48</ref>

==Civil War==
{{U.S. cities in the Civil War}}

The cities played a major part in the Civil War, providing soldiers, money, training camps, supplies, and media support for the [[Union (American Civil War)|Union war effort]].

In the North, discontent with the 1863 [[Conscription in the United States#Early drafts|draft]] law led to riots in several cities and in rural areas as well. By far the most important were the [[New York City draft riots]] of July 13 to July 16, 1863.<ref>Barnet Schecter, ''The Devil's Own Work: The Civil War Draft Riots and the Fight to Reconstruct America'' (2005)</ref> [[Irish Catholic]] and other workers fought police, militia and regular army units until the Army used artillery to sweep the streets. Initially focused on the draft, the protests quickly expanded into violent attacks on blacks in New York City, with many killed on the streets.<ref>[https://www.press.uchicago.edu/Misc/Chicago/317749.html The New York City Draft Riots] ''In the Shadow of Slavery: African Americans in New York City'', 1626–1863, by [[Leslie M. Harris]]</ref>

A study of the small Michigan cities of Grand Rapids and Niles shows an overwhelming surge of nationalism in 1861, whipping up enthusiasm for the war in all segments of society, and all political, religious, ethnic, and occupational groups. However, by 1862 the casualties were mounting and the war was increasingly focused on freeing the slaves in addition to preserving the Union.<ref>Peter Bratt, "A Great Revolution in Feeling: The American Civil War in Niles and Grand Rapids, Michigan," ''Michigan Historical Review'' (2005) 31#2 pp 43–66.</ref>  [[Copperheads (politics)|Copperhead Democrats]] called the war a failure and it became more and more a partisan Republican effort.<ref>Martin J. Hershock, "Copperheads and Radicals: Michigan Partisan Politics during the Civil War Era, 1860–1865," ''Michigan Historical Review'' (1992) 18#1 pp 28–69</ref>

===Confederacy===
Cities played a much less important part in the heavily rural Confederacy. When the war started the largest cities in slave states were seized in 1861 by the Union, including Washington, Baltimore, Wheeling, Louisville, and St. Louis. The largest and most important Confederate city, New Orleans, was captured in early 1862, and Nashville in 1863. All these cities became major logistic and strategic centers for the Union forces.  All the remaining ports were blockaded by the summer of 1861, ending normal commercial traffic, with only very expensive blockade runners getting through. The largest remaining cities were Atlanta, the railroad center which was destroyed in 1864, in the national capital in Richmond which held out to the bitter end.<ref>Andrew L. Slap, and Frank Towers, eds. ''Confederate Cities: The Urban South during the Civil War Era''  (University of Chicago Press, 2015). xiv, 302 pp. 
</ref>

The overall decline in food supplies, made worse by the inadequate transportation system, led to serious shortages and high prices in Confederate cities. When bacon reached a dollar a pound in 1864, the poor white women of Richmond, Atlanta and many other cities began to riot; they broke into shops and warehouses to seize food. The women expressed their anger at ineffective state relief efforts, speculators, merchants and planters. As wives and widows of soldiers they were hurt by the inadequate welfare system.<ref>Stephanie McCurry, "'Bread or Blood!'" ''Civil War Times'' (2011) 50#3 pp 36–41.</ref><ref>Teresa Crisp Williams, and David Williams, "'The Women Rising': Cotton, Class, and Confederate Georgia's Rioting Women," ''Georgia Historical Quarterly,'' (2002) 86#12 pp. 49–83</ref>

The eleven Confederate states in 1860 had 297 towns and cities with 835,000 people. Of these, 162 towns and cities with 681,000 people were at one point occupied by Union forces. Eleven were destroyed or severely damaged by war action, including Atlanta (with an 1860 population of 9,600), Charleston, Columbia, and Richmond (with prewar populations of 40,500, 8,100, and 37,900, respectively). The eleven contained 115,900 people in the 1860 census, or 14% of the urban South. The number of people as of 1860 who lived in the destroyed towns represented just over 1% of the Confederacy's 1860 population.<ref>Paul F. Paskoff, "Measures of War: A Quantitative Examination of the Civil War's Destructiveness in the Confederacy," ''Civil War History,'' (2008) 54#1 pp 35–62</ref>

== Late 19th century growth==
{{Further|Gilded Age}}

===Street traffic===
[[File:The last of the Horse Drawn Carriages.JPG|thumb|Horse-drawn trams continued to be used in [[New York City]] until 1917.]]
In a horse-drawn era, streets were unpaved and covered with dirt or gravel.  However, they produced uneven wear, opened new hazards for pedestrians and made for dangerous potholes for bicycles and for motor vehicles. Manhattan alone had 130,000 horses in 1900, pulling streetcars, wagons, and carriages, and leaving their waste behind. They were not fast, and pedestrians could dodge and scramble their way across the crowded streets.  Small towns continued to rely on dirt and gravel, but larger cities wanted much better streets, so they looked to wood or granite blocks.<ref>David O. Whitten, "A Century of Parquet Pavements: Wood as a Paving Material In The United States And Abroad, 1840-1940." ''Essays in Economic and Business History'' 15 (1997): 209-26.</ref>

In 1890, a third of Chicago's 2000 miles of streets were paved, chiefly with wooden blocks, which gave better traction than mud.  Brick surfacing was a good compromise, but even better was [[Asphalt concrete|asphalt]] paving. With London and Paris as models, Washington laid 400,000 square yards of asphalt paving by 1882, and served as a model for Buffalo, Philadelphia and elsewhere. By the end of the century, American cities boasted 30 million square yards of asphalt paving, followed by brick construction.<ref>Arthur Maier Schlesinger, ''The Rise of the City: 1878-1898'' (1933) p 88-93.</ref>

In the largest cities, street railways were elevated, which increased their speed and lessened their dangers. Street-level trolleys moved passengers at 12 miles per hour for 5 cents a ride, with free transfers. They became the main transportation service for middle class shoppers and office workers until they bought automobiles after 1945 and commuted from more distant suburbs in privacy and comfort.<ref>John D. Fairfield, "Rapid Transit: Automobility and Settlement in Urban America" ''Reviews in American History'' 23#1 (1995), pp. 80-85 [https://www.jstor.org/stable/2703240 online].</ref>

The working-class typically walked to nearby factories and patronized small local stores.  Big-city streets became paths for faster and larger and more dangerous vehicles, the pedestrians beware.  Underground subways were a solution, with Boston building one in the 1890s followed by New York a decade later.<ref>John D. Fairfield, "Rapid Transit: Automobility and Settlement in Urban America" ''Reviews in American History'' 23#1 (1995), pp. 80-85 [https://www.jstor.org/stable/2703240 online].</ref>

=== The new West ===
After 1860, railroads pushed westward into unsettled territory. They built service towns to handle the needs of railroad construction and repair crews, train crews, and passengers who ate meals at scheduled stops.<ref>John C. Hudson, "Towns of the western railroads." ''Great Plains Quarterly'' 2#1 (1982): 41-54. [https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2671&context=greatplainsquarterly online]</ref>  Gunfights and disorder characterized the [[railhead]] towns that were the target of major [[cattle drive]]s from Texas.  The violence was often exaggerated in [[dime novel]]s.<ref>Robert R. Dykstra, ''The cattle towns'' (1983).</ref><ref>[[Odie B. Faulk]], ''Dodge City: The Most Western Town Of All'' (1977).</ref>

In most of the South, there were very few cities of any size for miles around, and this held for Texas as well. Railroads arrived in the 1880s and they shipped the cattle out; cattle drives became short-distance affairs.  However the passenger trains were often the targets of armed gangs.<ref>William C. Holden, "Law and Lawlessness on the Texas Frontier, 1875-1890." ''The Southwestern Historical Quarterly'' 44.2 (1940): 188-203. [https://www.jstor.org/stable/30240564 in JSTOR]</ref>

[[Denver]]'s economy before 1870 had been rooted in mining. It then grew by expanding its role in railroads, wholesale trade, manufacturing, food processing, and servicing the growing agricultural and ranching hinterland. Between 1870 and 1890, manufacturing output soared from $600,000 to $40 million, and the population grew by a factor of 20 times to 107,000. Denver had always attracted miners, workers, whores and travelers. Saloons and gambling dens sprung up overnight. The city fathers boasted of its fine theaters, and especially the Tabor Grand Opera House built in 1881.<ref>Stephen J. Leonard, and Thomas J. Noel, ''Denver: Mining Camp to Metropolis'' (1990) pp.&nbsp;44–45</ref>

By 1890, Denver had grown to be the 26th largest city in America, and the fifth-largest city west of the Mississippi River.<ref>{{cite web|url = https://www.census.gov/population/www/documentation/twps0027/tab12.txt|title = Population of the 100 Largest Urban Places: 1890|publisher = U.S. Bureau of the Census|date = 15 June 1998}}</ref> The boom times attracted millionaires and their mansions, as well as hustlers, poverty and crime. Denver gained regional notoriety with its range of bawdy houses, from the sumptuous quarters of renowned madams to the squalid "cribs" located a few blocks away.<ref>Clark Secrest. ''Hell's Belles: Prostitution, Vice, and Crime in Early Denver, with a Biography of Sam Howe, Frontier Lawman.'' (2nd ed., 2002)</ref>

Business was good; visitors spent lavishly, then left town. As long as madams conducted their business discreetly, and "crib girls" did not advertise their availability too crudely, authorities took their bribes and looked the other way. Occasional cleanups and crack downs satisfied the demands for reform.<ref>Clark Secrest. ''Hell's Belles: Prostitution, Vice, and Crime in Early Denver, with a Biography of Sam Howe, Frontier Lawman.'' (2nd ed., 2002)</ref>

With its giant mountain of copper, [[Butte, Montana]] was the largest, richest and rowdiest [[mining camp]] on the frontier. It was an ethnic stronghold, with the Irish Catholics in control of politics and of the best jobs at the leading mining corporation [[Anaconda Copper]].<ref>David M. Emmons, ''The Butte Irish: class and ethnicity in an American mining town, 1875-1925'' (1990).</ref> City boosters opened a public library in 1894. Ring argues that the library was originally a mechanism of social control, "an antidote to the miners' proclivity for drinking, whoring, and gambling." It was also designed to promote middle-class values and to convince Easterners the Butte was a cultivated city.<ref>Daniel F. Ring, "The Origins of the Butte Public Library: Some Further Thoughts on Public Library Development in the State of Montana," ''Libraries & Culture'' (1993) 28#4 pp.&nbsp;430–44 [https://www.jstor.org/stable/25542594 in JSTOR]</ref> Appreciative crowds filled the large, upscale "Belasco" opera house for full-scale operas and top-name artists.<ref>Archie L. Clark, "John Maguire, Butte's" Belasco"." The Montana Magazine of History (1952): 32-40. [https://www.jstor.org/stable/4515771 in JSTOR]</ref>

===Skyscrapers and apartment buildings===
{{Main|skyscraper|apartment|tenement}}
[[File:Home Insurance Building.JPG|thumb|Chicago's [[Home Insurance Building]], often considered the world's first skyscraper, was completed in 1885|alt=A ten-story square commercial building of various Romanesque designs of its floors, seen at a 3/4 view]]
In Chicago and New York, new inventions facilitated the emergence of the skyscraper in the 1880s—it was a characteristic American style that was not widely copied around the world until the late 20th century. Construction required several major innovations, the elevator, and the steel beam.  The steel skeleton, developed in the 1880s, replaced the heavy brick walls that were limited to 15 or so stories in height. The skyscraper also required a complex internal structure to solve difficult issues of ventilation, steam heat, gas lighting (and later electricity), and plumbing.<ref>George H. Douglas, ''Skyscrapers: A social history of the very tall building in America'' (2004)</ref> Urban housing involved a wide variety of styles, but most of the attention focused on the tenement house for the working class, and the apartment building for the middle class.

The apartment building came first, as middle-class professionals, businessmen, and white-collar workers realized they did not need and could scarcely afford single-family dwellings of the type that low land costs in the towns permitted. Boarding houses were inappropriate for family; hotel suites were too expensive.  In smaller cities, there were many apartments over stores and shops, usually occupied by proprietors of small local businesses. The residents paid rent, and did not own their apartments until the emergence of cooperatives in New York City in the 20th century, and condominiums around the country after World War II. Turnover was very high, and there was seldom was a sense of neighborhood community.<ref>Amy Kallman Epstein, "Multifamily Dwellings and the Search for Respectability: Origins of the New York Apartment House," ''Urbanism Past & Present'' (1980) Issue 2, pp 29-39</ref><ref>Elizabeth Collins Cromley, ''Alone Together: A History of New York's Early Apartments'' (1990)</ref>
  
Starting with the Stuyvesant luxury apartment house that opened in New York in 1869, and [[The Dakota]] in 1884, affluent tenants discovered that full-time staff handled the upkeep and maintenance, as well as security.<ref>{{cite book|first = Stephen|last = Birmingham|title = Life at the Dakota|date = 1979|publisher = Random House|isbn = 9780394410791|url-access = registration|url = https://archive.org/details/lifeatdakotanew00birm}}</ref><ref>Andrew Alpern, ''New York's Fabulous Luxury Apartments: With Original Floor Plans from the Dakota, River House, Olympic Tower and Other Great Buildings'' (1987) covers 75 famous buildings starting in 1869.</ref>

The less-lavish middle-class apartment buildings provided gas lighting, elevators, good plumbing, central heating, and maintenance men on call.<ref>{{cite book|first = Elizabeth|last = Blackmar|title =Manhattan for Rent, 1785-1850|date =1989 |publisher = Cornell University Press|isbn = 9780801420245}}</ref>  Boston contractors build 16,000 "Triple-Deckers" Between 1870 and 1920. They were modern well-equipped buildings with a single large apartments on each floor. Chicago built thousands of apartment buildings, with the upscale ones close to the lake, where it was warmer in the winter and cooler in the summer.<ref>Neil Harris, ''Chicago Apartments: A Century of Lakefront Luxury'' (2004)</ref> In every city, apartment buildings were built along the paths of the street railways, for the middle-class tenants rode the streetcar to work, while the working class saved a nickel each way and walked.

The working class crowded into tenement houses, with far fewer features and amenities. They were cheap and easy to build, and filled up almost the entire lot. There were typically five story walk-ups, with four separate apartments on each floor. There was minimal air circulation and sunlight. Until the reforms of 1879, New York tenements lacked running water or indoor toilets. Garbage pickup was erratic until late in the 19th century. Rents were cheap for those who could endure the dust, clutter, smells and noises; the only cheaper alternatives were squalid basement rooms in older buildings.  Most of the tenements survived until the urban renewal movement of the 1950s.<ref>Richard Plunz, ''A History of Housing in New York City: Dwelling Type and Social Change in the American Metropolis'' (1990).</ref><ref>Raymond A. Mohl, ''The New City: Urban America in the Industrial Age, 1860-1920'' (1985) pp 47-52</ref>

===Lure of the metropolis===
Jeffersonian America distrusted the city, and rural spokesmen repeatedly warned their young men away.<ref>Schlesinger, ''The rise of the city'' pp. 53–77</ref> In 1881 ''The Evening Wisconsin'' newspaper warned cautious boys to stay on the farm. As paraphrased by historian Bayrd Still, the editor painted a grim contrast:
<blockquote>Pure milk, wholesome water, mellow fruit, vegetables, and proper sleep and exercise are lacking in the city; and the "dense centers of population are unfavorable to moral growth as they are to  physical development." Sharpness and deception characterize the city merchant, mechanic, and professional man as well. How different is the situation of the "sturdy farmer removed from the dust and smoke and filth and vice of the crowded city. ... Content in his cottage ... why should he long for the fare and follies of the madding crowd in the Gay Metropolis?</blockquote>
The response came from a Milwaukee newspaper editor in 1871, who boasted that the ambitious young man could not be stopped: 
<blockquote>The young man in the country no sooner elects for himself his course, than he makes for the nearest town. Scarcely has he grown familiar with his new surroundings, when the subtle attractions of the remoter city begin to tell upon him. There is no resisting it. It draws him like a magnet. Sooner or later, it is tolerably certain, he will be sucked into one of the great centers of life.<ref>Bayrd Still, "Milwaukee, 1870-1900: The Emergence of a Metropolis", ''Wisconsin Magazine of History'' (1939) 23#2 pp. 138–162 [https://www.jstor.org/stable/4631304 in JSTOR], quotes at pp, 143, 139</ref></blockquote>

===Reformers===
Historians have developed an elaborate typology of reformers in the late 19th century, focusing especially on the urban reformers.<ref>Raymond A Mohl, ''The New City: Urban America in the Industrial Age, 1860-1920'' (1985) pp 108-37, 218-220</ref>

The [[Mugwumps]] were reform-minded Republicans who acted at the national level in the 1870s and 1880s, especially in 1884 when they split their ticket for Democrat Grover Cleveland.<ref>Gerald W. McFarland, "The New York mugwumps of 1884: A profile." ''Political Science Quarterly'' (1963): 40-58 [https://www.jstor.org/stable/2146666 in JSTOR].</ref>  The "Goo Goos" were the local equivalent:  the middle-class reformers who sought "good government" regardless of party.  They typically focused on urban sanitation, better schools, and lower trolley fares for the middle-class commuters. They especially demanded a nonpolitical civil service system to replace the "spoils of victory" approach by which the winners of an election replaced city and school employees.<ref>{{cite book|author=Kevin P. Murphy|title=Political Manhood: Red Bloods, Mollycoddles, and the Politics of Progressive Era Reform|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=-KZ_tnz6j2EC&pg=PA64|year=2013|publisher=Columbia UP|page=64|isbn=9780231503501}}</ref>

They often formed short-lived citywide organizations, such as The Committee of 70 in New York, the Citizens' Reform Association in Philadelphia, the Citizens' Association of Chicago, and the Baltimore Reform League. They sometimes won citywide elections, but were rarely reelected. Party regulars laughed at them for trying to be independent of the political party machines by forming nonpartisan tickets. The ridicule included suggestions that the reformers were not real men: they were sissies and "mollycoddles".<ref>{{cite book|author=Kevin P. Murphy|title=Political Manhood: Red Bloods, Mollycoddles, and the Politics of Progressive Era Reform|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=-KZ_tnz6j2EC&pg=PA64|year=2013|publisher=Columbia UP|page=64|isbn=9780231503501}}</ref>

By the 1890s, when historians call "structural reformers" were emerging; they were much more successful at reform, and marked the beginning of the [[Progressive era]]. They used national organizations, such as the [[National Municipal League]], and focused on broader principles such as honesty, efficiency, economy, and centralized decision-making by experts.  "Efficiency" was their watchword, they believed one of the problems with the machines was that they wasted enormous amounts of tax money by creating useless patronage jobs and payoffs to mid-level politicians.<ref>Martin J. Schiesl, ''The politics of efficiency: Municipal administration and reform in America, 1880-1920'' (1980)</ref>

Social reformers emerged in the 1890s, most famously [[Jane Addams]] Enter large complex network of reformers based at [[Hull House]] in Chicago.<ref>Kathryn Kish Sklar, "Hull House in the 1890s: A community of women reformers." ''Signs'' (1985): 658-677 [https://www.jstor.org/stable/3174308 in JSTOR]</ref> They were less interested in civil service reform or revising the city charter, and concentrated instead on the needs of working class housing, child labor, sanitation and welfare. Protestant churches promoted their own group of reformers, mostly women activists demanding prohibition  or sharp reductions in the baleful influence of the saloon in damaging family finances and causing family violence.<ref>Mohl, ''The New City'' pp 115-33</ref>

Rural America was increasingly won over by the prohibitionists, but they rarely had success in the larger cities, where they were staunchly opposed by the large German and Irish elements.<ref>Mohl, ''The New City'' pp 115-33</ref>  However, the [[Women's Christian Temperance Union]] became well organized in cities of every size, and taught middle-class women the techniques of organization, proselytizing, and propaganda. Many of the WCTU veterans graduated into the woman's suffrage movement. Moving relentlessly from West to East, became the vote for women in state after state, and finally nationwide in 1920.<ref>Ruth Bordin, ''Woman and Temperance: The quest for power and liberty, 1873-1900'' (1981)</ref><ref>Elisabeth S. Clemens, "Organizational repertoires and institutional change: Women's groups and the transformation of US politics, 1890-1920." ''American journal of sociology'' (1993): 755-798. [https://www.jstor.org/stable/2781235 in JSTOR]</ref>

School reform was high on the agenda, since local machine politicians used the jobs in the contracts, promote the party interest, rather than the needs of the students. After examining late 19th century reform movements in New York, Philadelphia, St. Louis, San Francisco and Chicago, historian [[David Tyack]] concludes that "what the structural reformers wanted to do, then, was to replace a rather mechanical form of public bureaucracy, which was permeated with 'illegitimate' lay influence, with a streamlined 'professional' bureaucracy in which lay control was carefully filtered through a corporate school board.<ref>David B. Tyack, ''The one best system: A history of American urban education'' (1974) p 168.</ref>

===Sanitation and public health ===
{{further|History of water supply and sanitation}}
Sanitary conditions were bad throughout urban America in the 19th century. The worst conditions appeared in the largest cities, where the accumulation of human and horse waste built up on the city streets, where sewage systems were inadequate, and the water supply was of dubious quality.<ref>Stuart Galishoff, ''Newark: the nation's unhealthiest city, 1832-1895'' (1988).</ref>  Physicians took the lead in pointing out problems, and were of two minds on the causes. The older theory of contagion said that germs spread disease, but this theory was increasingly out of fashion by the 1840s or 1850s for two reasons.<ref>Thomas Neville Bonner, ''Medicine in Chicago: 1850–1950: A chapter in the social and scientific development of a city'' (1957) pp. 24–39</ref>  

On the one hand it predicted too much— microscopes demonstrated so many various microorganisms that there was no particular reason to associate any one of them with a specific disease. There was also a political dimension; a contagious theory of disease called for aggressive public health measures, which meant taxes and regulation the business community rejected.<ref>Thomas Neville Bonner, ''Medicine in Chicago: 1850–1950: A chapter in the social and scientific development of a city'' (1957) pp. 24–39</ref>  

Before the 1880s, most experts believed in the "[[Miasma theory]]" which attributed the spread of disease to "bad air" caused by the abundance of dirt and animal waste. It indicated the need for regular garbage pickup.  By the 1880s, European discovery of the germ theory of disease proved decisive for the medical community, although popular belief never shook the old "bad air" theory.  Medical attention shifted from curing the sick patient to stopping the spread of the disease in the first place.  It indicated a system of quarantines, hospitalization, clean water, and proper sewage disposal.<ref>Martin V. Melosi, ''The Sanitary City: Urban Infrastructure in America from Colonial Times to the Present'' (2000)</ref>  

Dr [[Charles V. Chapin]] (1856–1941), head of public health in Providence Rhode Island, was a tireless campaigner for the germ theory of disease, which he repeatedly validated with his laboratory studies.  Chapin  emphatically told popular audiences germs were the true culprit, not  filth; that diseases were not indiscriminately transmitted through the smelly air; and that disinfection was not a cure-all.  He paid little attention to environmental or chemical hazards in the air and water, or to tobacco smoking, since germs were not involved. They did not become a major concern of the public health movement until the 1960s.<ref>James H. Cassedy, ''Charles V. Chapin and the Public Health Movement'' (1962).</ref>  

The second stage of public health, building on the germ theory, brought in engineers to design elaborate water and sewer systems. Their expertise was welcomed, and many became city managers after that reform was introduced in the early 20th century.<ref>Stanley K. Schultz, and Clay McShane. "To engineer the metropolis: sewers, sanitation, and city planning in late-nineteenth-century America." ''Journal of American History'' (1978): 389–411. [https://www.jstor.org/stable/1894086 in JSTOR]</ref><ref>Jon C. Teaford, ''The Unheralded Triumph: City Government in America, 1870–1900'' (1984) pp. 134–41</ref>

== 20th century==
In the era 1890–1930, the larger cities were the focus of national attention. The skyscrapers and tourist attractions were widely publicized. Suburbs existed, but they were largely bedroom communities for commuters to the central city. San Francisco dominated the West, Atlanta dominated the South, Boston dominated New England. Chicago, the nation's railroad hub, dominated the Midwest,  New York City dominated the entire nation in terms of communications, trade, finance, as well as popular culture and high culture. More than a fourth of the 300 largest corporations in 1920 were headquartered in New York City.<ref>David R. Goldfield and Blaine A. Brownell, ''Urban America: A History''(2nd ed. 1990), p. 299</ref>

===Progressive era: 1890s–1920s===
During the [[Progressive Era]] a coalition of middle-class reform-oriented voters, academic experts and reformers hostile to the political machines introduced a series of reforms in urban America, designed to reduce waste and inefficiency and corruption, by introducing scientific methods, compulsory education and administrative innovations.

The pace was set in Detroit Michigan, where Republican mayor [[Hazen S. Pingree]] first put together the reform coalition.<ref>Melvin G. Holli, ''Reform in Detroit: Hazen S. Pingree and Urban Politics'' (1969).</ref>

Many cities set up municipal reference bureaux to study the budgets and administrative structures of local governments. Progressive mayors were important in many cities,<ref>Kenneth Finegold, "Traditional Reform, Municipal Populism, and Progressivism," ''Urban Affairs Review'', (1995) 31#1 pp. 20–42</ref> such as [[Cleveland]] (especially Mayor [[Tom L. Johnson]]); [[Toledo, Ohio]];<ref>Arthur E. DeMatteo, "The Progressive As Elitist: 'Golden Rule' Jones And The Toledo Charter Reform Campaign of 1901", ''Northwest Ohio Quarterly'', (1997) 69#1 pp. 8–30</ref> Jersey City, New Jersey;<ref>Eugene M. Tobin, "The Progressive as Single Taxer: Mark Fagan and the Jersey City Experience, 1900–1917," ''American Journal of Economics & Sociology'', (1974) 33#3  pp. 287–298</ref> [[Los Angeles]];<ref>Martin J. Schiesl, "Progressive Reform in Los Angeles under Mayor Alexander, 1909–1913," ''California Historical Quarterly'', (1975) 534#1, pp:37–56</ref> [[Memphis, Tennessee]];<ref>G. Wayne Dowdy, "'A Business Government by a Business Man': E. H. Crump as a Progressive Mayor, 1910–1915", ''Tennessee Historical Quarterly'', (2001) 60#3 3, pp. 162–175</ref> [[Louisville, Kentucky]];<ref>William E. Ellis, "Robert Worth Bingham and Louisville Progressivism, 1905–1910", ''Filson Club History Quarterly'', (1980) 54#2 pp 169–195</ref> and many other cities, especially in the western states. In [[History of Illinois|Illinois]], Governor [[Frank Lowden]] undertook a major reorganization of state government.<ref>William Thomas Hutchinson, ''Lowden of Illinois: the life of Frank O. Lowden'' (1957) vol. 2</ref> Wisconsin was the stronghold of [[Robert La Follette]], who led a wing of the Republican Party. His [[Wisconsin Idea]] used the state university as a major source of ideas and expertise.<ref>{{cite web|title=Progressivism and the Wisconsin Idea|url=https://www.wisconsinhistory.org/turningpoints/tp-036/?action=more_essay|publisher=[[Wisconsin Historical Society]]|year=2008}}</ref>

One of the most dramatic changes came in [[Galveston, Texas]], where a devastating hurricane and flood overwhelmed the resources of local government. Reformers abolished political parties in municipal elections, and set up a five-man commission of experts to rebuild the city. The Galveston idea was simple, efficient, and much less conducive to corruption. If lessened the Democratic influences of the average voter, but multiplied the influence of the reform minded middle-class.<ref>Bradley R. Rice, "The Galveston Plan of City Government by Commission: The Birth of a Progressive Idea." ''Southwestern Historical Quarterly'' (1975): 365–408.</ref>

The Galveston plan was quickly copied by many other cities, especially in the West.  By 1914 over 400 cities had nonpartisan elected commissions.<ref>Bradley R. Rice, ''Progressive Cities: The Commission Government Movement in America, 1901–1920'' (2014).</ref> [[Dayton, Ohio]] Had its great flood in 1913, and responded with the innovation of a paid, non-political [[city manager]], hired by the commissioners to run the bureaucracy; mechanical engineers were especially preferred.<ref>Stefan Couperus,  "The managerial revolution in local government: municipal management and the city manager in the USA and the Netherlands 1900–1940", ''Management & Organizational History'' (2014) 9#4 pp: 336–352.</ref><ref>Richard J. Stillman, ''The Rise of the City Manager: A Public Professional in Local Government'' (University of New Mexico Press, 1974)</ref>

=== Urban planning===
{{main|History of urban planning}}
{{further|Urban sprawl}}
The [[Garden city movement]] was brought over from England and evolved into the "Neighborhood Unit" form of development. In the early 1900s, as cars were introduced to city streets for the first time, residents became increasingly concerned with the number of pedestrians being injured by car traffic. The response, seen first in Radburn, New Jersey, was the Neighborhood Unit-style development, which oriented houses toward a common public path instead of the street. The neighborhood is distinctively organized around a school, with the intention of providing children a safe way to walk to school.<ref>Carol Ann Christensen, ''The American garden city and the new towns movement'' (1986).</ref><ref>Daniel Schaffer, ''Garden Cities for America: The Radburn Experience'' (Temple University Press, 1982)</ref>

=== The Great Depression ===
{{main|Great Depression in the United States}}
Urban America had enjoyed strong growth and steady prosperity in the 1920s.  Large-scale immigration had ended in 1914, and never fully resumed, so that ethnic communities have become stabilized and Americanized. Upward mobility was the norm, in every sector of the population supported the rapidly growing high school system.  After the stock market crash of October 1929, the nation's optimism suddenly turned negative, with both business investments and private consumption overwhelmed by a deepening pessimism that encouraged people to cut back and reduce their expectations.<ref>William H, Mullins, ''The Depression and the Urban West Coast, 1929-1933: Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle, and Portland'' (2000)</ref>

The economic damage to the cities was most serious in the collapse of 80 to 90 percent of the private sector construction industry.  Cities and states started expanding their own construction programs as early as 1930, and they became a central feature of the New Deal, but private construction did not fully recover until after 1945. Many landlords so their rental income drained away and many went bankrupt.<ref>William H, Mullins, ''The Depression and the Urban West Coast, 1929-1933: Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle, and Portland'' (2000)</ref>

After construction, was the widespread downturn in heavy industry, especially manufacturing of durable goods such as automobiles, machinery, and refrigerators.  The impact of unemployment was higher in the manufacturing centers in the East and Midwest, and lower in the South and West, which had less manufacturing.<ref>William H, Mullins, ''The Depression and the Urban West Coast, 1929-1933: Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle, and Portland'' (2000)</ref>

[[File:Huts and unemployed, West Houston and Mercer St., Manhattan (NYPL b13668355-482853).jpg|thumb|Huts and unemployed men in New York City, 1935.]]
One visible effect of the depression was the advent of [[Hooverville]]s, which were  ramshackle assemblages on vacant lots of cardboard boxes, tents, and small rickety wooden sheds built by homeless people. Residents lived in shacks and begged for food or went to soup kitchens. The term was coined by Charles Michelson, publicity chief of the Democratic National Committee, who referred sardonically to President [[Herbert Hoover]] whose policies he blamed for the depression.<ref>Hans Kaltenborn, ''It Seems Like Yesterday'' (1956) p. 88</ref>

Unemployment reached 25 percent in the worst days of 1932–33, but it was unevenly distributed.  Job losses were  less severe among women than men, among workers in nondurable industries, such as food and clothing, in services and sales, and in government jobs.  The least skilled inner city men had much higher unemployment rates, as did young people who had a hard time getting their first job, and men over the age of 45 who if they lost their job would seldom find another one because employers had their choice of younger men.<ref>Richard J. Jensen, "The causes and cures of unemployment in the Great Depression." ''Journal of Interdisciplinary History'' (1989): 553-583  [https://www.jstor.org/stable/203954  in JSTOR]; [https://tigger.uic.edu/~rjensen/causes-cures.pdf online copy] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150416033021/https://tigger.uic.edu/~rjensen/causes-cures.pdf |date=2015-04-16 }}</ref>  

Millions were hired in the Great Depression, but men with weaker credentials were never hired, and fell into a long-term unemployment trap. The migration that brought millions of farmers and townspeople to the bigger cities in the 1920s suddenly reversed itself, as unemployment made the cities unattractive, and the network of kinfolk and more ample food supplies made it wise for many to go back.<ref>Richard J. Jensen, "The causes and cures of unemployment in the Great Depression." ''Journal of Interdisciplinary History'' (1989): 553-583  [https://www.jstor.org/stable/203954  in JSTOR]; [https://tigger.uic.edu/~rjensen/causes-cures.pdf online copy] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150416033021/https://tigger.uic.edu/~rjensen/causes-cures.pdf |date=2015-04-16 }}</ref>  

City governments in 1930–31 tried to meet the depression by expanding public works projects, as president Herbert Hoover strongly encouraged. However, tax revenues were plunging, and the cities as well as private relief agencies were totally overwhelmed; by 1931 men were unable to provide significant additional relief.  They fell back on the cheapest possible relief, soup kitchens which provided free meals for anyone who showed up.<ref>Janet Poppendieck, ''Breadlines knee-deep in wheat: Food assistance in the Great Depression'' (2014)</ref> After 1933 new sales taxes and infusions of federal money helped relieve the fiscal distress of the cities, but the budgets did not fully recover until 1941.

The federal programs launched by Hoover and greatly expanded by president Roosevelt's [[New Deal]] used massive construction projects to try to jump start the economy and solve the unemployment crisis.  The alphabet agencies ERA, CCC, FERA, WPA and PWA built and repaired the public infrastructure in dramatic fashion, but did little to foster the recovery of the private sector.  FERA, CCC and especially WPA focused on providing unskilled jobs for long-term unemployed men.

The Democrats won easy landslides in 1932 and 1934, and an even bigger one in 1936. The hapless Republican Party seemed doomed.  The Democrats capitalized on the magnetic appeal of Roosevelt to urban America. The key groups were low-skilled ethnics, especially Catholics, Jews, and blacks. The Democrats promised and delivered in terms of beer, political recognition, labor union membership, and relief jobs.  The city machines were stronger than ever, for they mobilize their precinct workers to help families who needed help the most navigate the bureaucracy and get on relief.<ref>Roger Biles, ''Big City Boss in Depression and War: Mayor Edward J. Kelly of Chicago'' (1984).</ref>  
  
FDR won the vote of practically every group in 1936, including  taxpayers, small business and the middle class. However the Protestant middle class voters but turned sharply against him after the recession of 1937–38 undermined repeated promises that recovery was at hand. Historically, local political machines were primarily interested in controlling their wards and citywide elections. The smaller the turnout on election day, the easier it was to control the system. However, for Roosevelt to win the presidency in 1936 and 1940, he needed to carry the electoral college and that meant he needed the largest possible majorities in the cities to overwhelm the out state vote.  The machines came through for him.<ref>Roger Biles, ''Big City Boss in Depression and War: Mayor Edward J. Kelly of Chicago'' (1984).</ref>  

The 3.5 million voters on relief payrolls during the 1936 election cast 82% percent of their ballots for Roosevelt. The rapidly growing, energetic labor unions, chiefly based in the cities, turned out 80% for FDR, as did Irish, Italian and Jewish communities. In all, the nation's 106 cities over 100,000 population voted 70% for FDR in 1936, compared to his 59% elsewhere.  Roosevelt worked very well with the big city machines, with the one exception of his old nemesis, [[Tammany Hall]] in Manhattan. There he [[History of New York City (1898–1945)#Politics|supported the complicated coalition]] built around the nominal Republican [[Fiorello La Guardia]],  and based on Jewish and Italian voters mobilized by labor unions.<ref>Mason B. Williams, ''City of Ambition: FDR, LaGuardia, and the Making of Modern New York'' (2013)</ref>

In 1938, the Republicans made an unexpected comeback, and Roosevelt's efforts to purge the Democratic Party of his political opponents backfired badly. The conservative coalition of Northern Republicans and Southern Democrats took control of Congress, outvoted the urban liberals, and handed the expansion of New Deal ideas.  Roosevelt survived in 1940 thanks to his margin in the Solid South and in the cities.  In the North the cities over 100,000 gave Roosevelt 60% of their votes, while the rest of the North favored the GOP candidate Wendell Willkie 52%-48%.<ref>Richard Jensen, "The cities reelect Roosevelt: Ethnicity, religion, and class in 1940." ''Ethnicity. An Interdisciplinary Journal of the Study of Ethnic Relations'' (1981) 8#2: 189-195.</ref>

With the start of full-scale war mobilization in the summer of 1940, the economies of the cities rebounded.  Even before Pearl Harbor, Washington pumped massive investments into new factories and funded round-the-clock  munitions production, guaranteeing a job to anyone who showed up at the factory gate.<ref>Jon C. Teaford, ''The twentieth-century American city'' (1986) pp 90-96.</ref>  The war brought a restoration of prosperity and hopeful expectations for the future across the nation. It had the greatest impact on the cities of the West Coast, especially Los Angeles, San Diego, San Francisco, Portland and Seattle.<ref>Roger W. Lotchin, ''The Bad City in the Good War: San Francisco, Los Angeles, Oakland, and San Diego'' (2003)</ref>

Economic historians led by Price Fishback have examined the impact of New Deal spending on improving health conditions in the 114 largest cities, 1929–1937.  They estimated that every additional $153,000 in relief spending in 1935 dollars, or $1.95 million in year 2000 dollars, was associated with a reduction of one infant death, one suicide, and 2.4 deaths from infectious disease.<ref>{{cite book|editor=Robert Whaples and Randall E. Parker|title=Routledge Handbook of Modern Economic History |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=yVb_O0v1OwoC&pg=PA8|year=2013|publisher=Routledge|page=8|isbn=9780415677042 }}</ref><ref>Price V. Fishback, Michael R. Haines, and Shawn Kantor, "Births, deaths, and New Deal relief during the Great Depression." The Review of Economics and Statistics 89.1 (2007): 1-14, citing page [https://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdfplus/10.1162/rest.89.1.1 online]</ref>

==21st century==
[[File:LYNX Car 104 at TremontStation.jpg|thumb|Many cities in the U.S. began adding more public transportation systems in the 21st century, such as the [[Lynx Blue Line]] that opened in 2007 in [[Charlotte, North Carolina]]]]
[[File:Austin, Texas Skyline 2018.jpg|thumb|350px|[[Austin, Texas]], like other cities throughout the Southern and Western states, has boomed in recent years.]]
During the beginning of the 21st century, many cities in the South and West experienced significant growth in terms of population. This was trend that continued from the late 20th century where a lot of growth occurred in cities in the [[Sunbelt]] region. Texas in particular has experienced a tremendous amount of growth in the 21st century so far as the state with the largest population jump, with cities like [[Austin, Texas|Austin]], [[San Antonio]], [[Dallas]], [[Fort Worth]], [[Houston]], and many of their suburbs constantly being ranked as the fastest-growing cities in the country.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.dallasnews.com/business/demographics/2016/12/22/lone-star-state-texas-adds-almost-1200-residents-per-day|title = Not so a-Lone Star State: Why Texas adds almost 1,200 residents per day|date = 23 December 2016}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.census.gov/newsroom/press-releases/2016/cb16-81.html|title = Five of the Nation's Eleven Fastest-Growing Cities are in Texas}}</ref>

Other cities in the South that have experienced significant population growth recently include [[Atlanta]], [[Washington, DC|Washington]], [[Tampa]], [[Orlando, Florida|Orlando]], [[Miami]], [[Nashville]], [[Charlotte, North Carolina|Charlotte]], and [[Raleigh]]. Western cities have experienced lots of growth as well, with cities like [[Seattle]], [[Phoenix, Arizona|Phoenix]], [[Riverside, California|Riverside]], [[Denver]], [[Portland, Oregon|Portland]], and [[Las Vegas]] seeing a great influx of new residents. Smaller cities in the Southern and Western states have seen a large amount of population growth too, including [[Charleston, South Carolina|Charleston]], [[Myrtle Beach, South Carolina|Myrtle Beach]], [[Savannah, Georgia|Savannah]], [[Cape Coral, Florida|Cape Coral]], [[Sarasota, Florida|Sarasota]], [[Ogden, Utah|Ogden]], [[Colorado Springs, Colorado|Colorado Springs]], [[Boise, Idaho|Boise]], and more.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.census.gov/newsroom/press-releases/2018/popest-metro-county.html|title = Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington Has Largest Growth in the U.S.}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://wallethub.com/edu/fastest-growing-cities/7010/|title=Fastest-Growing Cities in America}}</ref><ref>^ "Annual Estimates of the Resident Population: April 1, 2010 to July 1, 2017".</ref>

There are exceptions in the Southern and Western states though to this trend of cities having a large influx of new residents with places like [[Los Angeles]], [[Memphis, Tennessee|Memphis]], [[Albuquerque]], and [[Birmingham, Alabama|Birmingham]] experiencing a slow growth in population, especially compared to other nearby areas. Some areas in the South and West have even seen population loss including [[Montgomery, Alabama|Montgomery]], [[Jackson, Mississippi|Jackson]], and parts of the [[San Francisco Bay Area]] like [[Marin County]].<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.census.gov/programs-surveys/popest/data/tables.2016.html|title = Population and Housing Unit Estimates Tables}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Bay-Area-population-growth-slows-some-counties-11021334.php|title = Bay Area population growth slows, some counties losing people|date = 23 March 2017}}</ref>

The San Francisco area, while overall still experiencing a decent population growth rate, has areas experiencing little to no growth and has more residents leaving than any other U.S. city due to the high cost of living in the region.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.businessinsider.com/san-francisco-bay-area-residents-moving-away-increase-u-haul-rental-prices-2018-3/|title=San Francisco is losing more residents than any other city in the US, creating a shortage of U-Hauls that puts a rental at $2,000 just to move to Las Vegas|website=[[Business Insider]] }}</ref> Meanwhile, cities in the [[Rust Belt]], such as [[Detroit]], [[Cleveland]], [[St. Louis]], [[Buffalo, New York|Buffalo]], [[Pittsburgh]], and [[Chicago]], have experienced negative or stagnant growth in terms of population too.<ref>Mark Peters, Jack Nicas. "Rust Belt Reaches for Immigration Tide", The Wall Street Journal, May 13, 2013, A3.</ref> Many people from these locations are moving to the booming cities in the Southern and Western states.

Starting in the late 20th century and continuing into the 21st century, many cities across the country began creating new public transportation systems. After many public transportation systems, such as streetcars, were scrapped in cities starting in the 1950s, the automobile dominated America's urban transportation network. However, many cities, especially in the 21st century, have started creating new, rebuilding, or expanding public transportation systems to help combat problems like traffic congestion and air pollution from all of the commuting vehicles.

Many cities have added new light rail systems, such as Phoenix's [[Valley Metro Rail]] or Charlotte's [[Lynx Blue Line]]. Other cities have heavily expanded their already existing transportation networks with new lines, such as the [[E Line (Los Angeles Metro)|Expo Line]] that opened in 2012 in Los Angeles. Modern streetcars have been built in various cities across America recently as well, including the [[Atlanta Streetcar]] and the [[Dallas Streetcar]]. Some cities though have rebuilt their heritage streetcars in the 21st century, such as Tampa with its [[TECO Line Streetcar]] that opened in 2002.

New commuter rail systems have been built in a bunch of cities too like Orlando's [[Sunrail]] or Seattle's [[Sounder Commuter Rail]]. Overall though, public transportation has been an important issue for 21st century American cities, and as a result there has been a large amount of focus on building or expanding various public transportation systems within urban areas.

== See also ==
* [[Environmental history of the United States]]
* [[History of Boston]]
* [[History of Chicago]]
* [[History of Cleveland]]
* [[History of Detroit]]
* [[History of Los Angeles]]
* [[History of New York City]]
* [[History of Philadelphia]]
* [[History of Pittsburgh]]
* [[Rural American history]]
* [[Suburb]] 
* [[Urban history]]
* [[Urbanism]]
* [[Local history#United States|Local history]]: United States
* [[:Category:Timelines of cities in the United States]]

==Notes==
<references/>

==Further reading==
{{further|Bibliography of suburbs#United States}}

===Surveys===
* Boehm, Lisa Krissoff, and Steven Hunt Corey. ''America's Urban History'' (2014); University textbook; [https://www.routledge.com/textbooks/9780415803984 see website]; [https://www.amazon.com/Americas-Urban-History-Krissoff-Boehm/dp/0415537606/ Detailed bibliography online it pages 351-78]
* Bridenbaugh, Carl. ''Cities in the Wilderness: The First Century of Urban Life in America, 1625-1742'' (1938)
* Bridenbaugh, Carl. ''Cities in Revolt: Urban Life in America, 1743-1776'' (1955)
* Brownell, Blaine A. and Goldfield, David R. ''The City in southern history: The growth of urban civilization in the South'' (1977) 
* Conn, Steven. ''Americans against the City: Anti-urbanism in the Twentieth Century'' (Oxford University Press, 2014)
* Douglass, Harlan Paul. ''1000 city churches: Phases of adaptation to urban environment'' (1926) [https://web.archive.org/web/20170312064138/https://www.dli.ernet.in/handle/2015/179550 online free].
* Friss, Evan. ''The Cycling City: Bicycles and Urban America in the 1890s'' (University of Chicago Press, 2015). x, 267 pp. 
* Glaab, Charles Nelson, and A. Theodore Brown. ''History of Urban America'' (1967) 
* Goldfield, David R. and Blaine A. Brownell. ''Urban America: A History''(2nd ed. 1990)
* Goldfield, David R. ed. ''Encyclopedia of American Urban History'' (2 vol Sage, 2007); comprehensive coverage; 1056 pp
* Kirkland, Edward C.  ''Industry Comes of Age, Business, Labor, and Public Policy 1860-1897'' (1961) esp 237-61 [https://archive.org/details/industrycomesofa0000unse_i1v9 online]
* Liazos, Ariane. ''Reforming the City: The Contested Origins of Urban Government, 01890–1930'' (Columbia University Press, 2020) [https://www.amazon.com/Reforming-City-Contested-Origins-Government-ebook/dp/B07PQYQQ1H/ excerpt], a major scholarly survey
* McDonald, John F. ''Urban America: Growth, Crisis, and Rebirth'' (ME Sharpe, 2007).
* McDonald, John F. ''Postwar urban America: Demography, economics, and social policies'' (Routledge, 2014).
* McKelvey, Blake. ''The urbanization of America, 1860-1915'' (1963), 390pp [https://archive.org/details/urbanizationofam0000mcke online]
* McKelvey, Blake. ''The Emergence of Metropolitan America, 1915-1960'' (1968), 320pp [https://archive.org/details/emergenceofmetro00mcke  online]
* Miller, Zane I. ''Urbanization of Modern America: A Brief History'' (2nd ed. 1987)
* Monkkonen, Eric H. ''America Becomes Urban: The Development of U.S. Cities and Towns, 1780-1980'' (1990), 336pp
* Rubin, Jasper. "Planning and American Urbanization since 1950." in  Craig E. Colten and Geoffrey L. Buckley, eds. ''North American Odyssey: Historical Geographies for the Twenty-first Century'' (2014): 395-412
* [[Arthur M. Schlesinger|Schlesinger, Arthur M.]] ''The rise of the city: 1878-1898'' (1933), A social history; [https://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=2344 Online review]
* Shumsky, Neil Larry, ed. ''Encyclopedia of Urban America'' (2 vol ABC-CLIO, 1998); comprehensive coverage, 970pp.
* Still, Bayrd. "Patterns of Mid-Nineteenth Century Urbanization in the Middle West," ''Mississippi Valley Historical Review'' (1941) 28#2 pp.&nbsp;187–206 [https://www.jstor.org/stable/1896212 in JSTOR]
* Taylor, George Rogers. "The Beginnings Of Mass Transportation In Urban America." ''Smithsonian Journal of History'' (1966) 1#2 pp 35–50; 1#3 pp 31–54; partly reprinted in Wakstein, ed., ''The Urbanization of America'' (1970) pp 128–50; Covers 1820-1960
* [[Jon C. Teaford|Teaford, Jon C.]] ''Cities of the Heartland: The Rise and Fall of the Industrial Midwest'' (1993)
* Teaford, Jon C. ''The Metropolitan Revolution: The Rise of Post-Urban America'' (2006)
* Teaford, Jon C. ''The Unheralded Triumph: City Government in America, 1870-1900'' (1984)
* Wade, Richard C. ''The Urban Frontier - Pioneer Life In Early Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, Lexington, Louisville, And St. Louis'' (2nd ed. 1976)

===Environment & public health===
* Cain, Louis P. "Sanitation in Chicago: A Strategy for a Lakefront Metropolis," ''Encyclopedia of Chicago'' (2004) [https://www.encyclopedia.chicagohistory.org/pages/300017.html online]
* Crane, Brian D. "Filth, garbage, and rubbish: Refuse disposal, sanitary reform, and nineteenth-century yard deposits in Washington, DC." ''Historical Archaeology'' (2000): 20–38. [https://www.jstor.org/stable/25616770 in JSTOR]
* Devienne, Elsa. "Urban renewal by the sea: Reinventing the beach for the suburban age in postwar Los Angeles." ''Journal of Urban History'' 45.1 (2019): 99-125. [https://scholar.google.com/scholar?output=instlink&q=info:OgtDAbZSc8YJ:scholar.google.com/&hl=en&as_sdt=0,27&as_ylo=2018&scillfp=8203666953666309785&oi=lle online]
* [[John Duffy (medical historian)|Duffy, John]]. ''The sanitarians: a history of American public health'' (1992)
* Eu, Rachel. "Sunlight and Gaslight: Mapping Light in Mid-Nineteenth-Century New York City." ''Journal of Urban History'' 48.2 (2022): 243-264.
* Frost, Lionel. "Water technology and the urban environment: water, sewerage, and disease in San Francisco and Melbourne before 1920." ''Journal of Urban History'' 46.1 (2020): 15-32. [https://scholar.google.com/scholar?output=instlink&q=info:AOThNtCNhJYJ:scholar.google.com/&hl=en&as_sdt=0,27&as_ylo=2018&scillfp=14785357236113917134&oi=lle online]
* Hochfelder, David, and Douglas Appler. "Introduction to special issue on urban renewal in smaller cities." ''Journal of Planning History'' 19.3 (2020): 139-143.
* Larsen, Lawrence H. "Nineteenth-Century Street Sanitation: A Study of Filth and Frustration," ''Wisconsin Magazine of History'' (1969) 52#3 pp.&nbsp;239–247 [https://www.jstor.org/stable/4634439 in JSTOR]
* Melosi, Martin V. ''Garbage in the cities: refuse reform and the environment'' (2004)
* Mohl, Raymond A. "Poverty, pauperism, and social order in the preindustrial American City, 1780-1840." ''Social Science Quarterly'' (1972): 934–948. [https://www.jstor.org/stable/42858906 in JSTOR]
* Rosenberg, Charles E. ''The cholera years: The United States in 1832, 1849, and 1866'' (1962)
* Strach, Patricia, Kathleen Sullivan, and Elizabeth Pérez-Chiqués. "The garbage problem: Corruption, innovation, and capacity in four American cities, 1890–1940." ''Studies in American Political Development'' 33.2 (2019): 209-233.

===City histories===
{{see also|Category:Bibliographies of cities}}
* Abu-Lughod, Janet L. ''New York, Chicago, Los Angeles: America's global cities'' (U of Minnesota Press, 1999). ISBN 978-0-8166-3336-4. [https://archive.org/details/newyorkchicagolo0000abul online] Compares the three cities in terms of geography, economics and race from 1800 to 1990.
* {{cite gotham}}, The standard scholarly history to 1898, 1390pp
* Homberger, Eric. ''The Historical Atlas of New York City: A Visual Celebration of 400 Years of New York City's History'' (2005)
* {{cite enc-nyc}}; second edition 2010
* McComb, David G. ''The City in Texas: A History'' (University of Texas Press, 2015) 342 pp. 
*Pierce, Bessie Louise. ''A History of Chicago from Town to Ciry 1848-1871 Vol II'' (1940)
**Pierce, Bessie Louise. ''A History of Chicago, Volume III: The Rise of a Modern City, 1871-1893'' (1957) [https://www.amazon.com/History-Chicago-Volume-III-1871-1893/dp/0226668428/ excerpt]
* Reiff, Janice L., Ann Durkin Keating and James R. Grossman, eds. ''The Encyclopedia of Chicago'' (2004), with thorough coverage by scholars in 1120 pages of text, maps and photos. [https://www.encyclopedia.chicagohistory.org/ it is online free]
* Shortridge, James R. ''Kansas City and How It Grew, 1822-2011'' (University Press of Kansas; 2012) 248 pages; historical geography [https://www.amazon.com/Kansas-City-How-Grew-1822-2011/dp/0700618821/  excerpt and text search]
* Shortridge, James R. ''Cities on the Plains: The Evolution of Urban Kansas'' (2004) [https://www.amazon.com/Cities-Plains-Evolution-Urban-Kansas/dp/0700613129/  Excerpt]

===Black history===
* Davis, D. F., et al. "Before the Ghetto: Black Detroit in the Nineteenth Century." ''Urban History Review'' (1977) 6#1 pp.&nbsp;99–106 [https://www.jstor.org/stable/43561566 in JSTOR]
* De Graaf, Lawrence B. "The city of black angels: Emergence of the Los Angeles ghetto, 1890-1930." ''Pacific Historical Review'' 39.3 (1970): 323–352. [https://www.jstor.org/stable/3637655 in JSTOR]
* Godshalk, David Fort. ''Veiled Visions: The 1906 Atlanta Race Riot and the Reshaping of American Race Relations'' (2006). [https://www.questia.com/library/120078632/veiled-visions-the-1906-atlanta-race-riot-and-the online]
* Goings, Kenneth, and Raymond Mohl, eds. ''The New African American Urban History'' (Sage Publications, 1996), 10 articles by scholars
* Green, Adam. ''Selling the race: Culture, community, and black Chicago, 1940-1955'' (2007).
* Grossman, James R. ''Land of hope: Chicago, black southerners, and the great migration'' (1991).
* Hornsby, Jr., Alton, ed. ''Black America: A State-by-State Historical Encyclopedia'' (2 vol 2011) [https://www.amazon.com/Black-America-volumes-State---State/dp/0313341125/  excerpt]
* Ince, Anthony, Thomas Borén, and Ilda Lindell. "After riots: Toward a research agenda on the long-term effects of urban unrest." ''Journal of Urban Affairs'' (2021): 1-18. [https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/07352166.2021.1898284 online]
* Kusmer, Kenneth L., and Joe W. Trotter, eds. ''African American Urban History Since World War II'' (U. University of Chicago Press, 2009).
* Kusmer, Kenneth L. ''A ghetto takes shape: Black Cleveland, 1870-1930'' (1978).
* Levesque, George A. ''Black Boston: African American life and culture in urban America, 1750–1860'' (Routledge, 2018).
* Osofsky, Gilbert. "A Decade of Urban Tragedy: How Harlem Became A Slum." ''New York History'' 46#4 (1965): 330–355. [https://www.jstor.org/stable/23162615 in JSTOR]
* Osofsky, Gilbert. ''Harlem: The Making of a Ghetto: Negro New York, 1890-1930'' (1971).
* Osofsky, Gilbert. "The Enduring Ghetto." ''Journal of American History'' 55.2 (1968): 243–255. [https://www.jstor.org/stable/1899555 in JSTOR]
* Pittman, Cassi. ""Shopping while Black": Black consumers' management of racial stigma and racial profiling in retail settings." ''Journal of Consumer Culture'' 20.1 (2020): 3-22. [https://scholar.google.com/scholar?output=instlink&q=info:7i3loBv3IkgJ:scholar.google.com/&hl=en&as_sdt=5,27&sciodt=0,27&as_ylo=2018&scillfp=9286577840073366301&oi=lle online]
* Rabinowitz, Howard N. ''Race relations in the urban South, 1865-1890'' (1978).
* Spear, Allan H. ''Black Chicago: The making of a Negro ghetto, 1890-1920'' (1967).
* Taylor, Keeanga-Yamahtta. ''Race for profit: How banks and the real estate industry undermined black homeownership'' (UNC Press Books, 2019).
* [[Taylor, Quintard]]. ''The forging of a black community: Seattle's central district from 1870 through the civil rights era'' (2011).
* Trotter, Joe, Earl Lewis, and Tera Hunter, eds. ''The African American urban experience: perspectives from the colonial period to the present'' (Springer, 2004).
* Trotter, Joe William. ''Black Milwaukee: The making of an industrial proletariat, 1915-45'' (University of Illinois Press, 1985).
** Trotter Jr, Joe William. "Black Milwaukee: Reflections on the Past Twenty Years." ''Journal of Urban History'' 33.4 (2007): 562-567.
* Young Jr, Alford. ''From the Edge of the Ghetto: African Americans and the World of Work'' (Rowman & Littlefield, 2019).

===Historiography===
* Reps, John. ''The Making of Urban America'' (1965)
* Abbott, Carl. "Urban History for Planners," ''Journal of Planning History,'' (2006) 5#4  pp 301–313
* Biles, Roger, and Mark H. Rose. "Tribute to Raymond A. Mohl, 1938–2015." Journal of Urban History 41.3 (2015): 360–367. [https://juh.sagepub.com/content/41/3/360.extract online]
* Ebner, Michael H. "Re-Reading Suburban America: Urban Population Deconcentration, 1810-1980," ''American Quarterly'' (1985) 37#3 pp.&nbsp;368–381 [https://www.jstor.org/stable/2712663 in JSTOR]
*Engeli, Christian, and Horst Matzerath. ''Modern urban history research in Europe, USA, and Japan: a handbook'' (1989) [https://books.google.com/books?id=lJ5PAAAAMAAJ in GoogleBooks]
* Frisch, Michael. "American urban history as an example of recent historiography." ''History and Theory'' (1979): 350–377. [https://www.jstor.org/stable/2504535 in JSTOR]
*  Gillette Jr., Howard, and Zane L. Miller, eds. '' American Urbanism: A Historiographical Review'' (1987) [https://www.questia.com/library/book/american-urbanism-a-historiographical-review-by-howard-gillette-jr-zane-l-miller.jsp online]
* Glasser, Ruth. "The farm in the city in the recent past: thoughts on a more inclusive urban historiography." ''Journal of Urban History'' 44.3 (2018): 501–518.
* Goings, Kenneth, and Raymond Mohl, eds. ''The New African American Urban History'' (Sage Publications, 1996), 10 articles by scholars
* Hammack, David C. "Elite Perceptions of Power in the Cities of the United States, 1880-1900: The Evidence of James Bryce, Moisei Ostrogorski, and Their American Informants." ''Journal of Urban History'' 4.4 (1978): 363-396.
* Hoover, Dwight W. "The Diverging Paths of American Urban History." ''American Quarterly'' (1968): 296–317. [https://www.jstor.org/stable/2711194 in JSTOR]
* Keating, Ann Durkin. "Chicagoland: More Than the Sum of Its Parts" ''Journal of Urban History'' 30##2 (2004) pp 213–30. doi.org/10.1177/0096144203258353
* Lees, Lynn Hollen. "The Challenge of Political Change: Urban History in the 1990s," ''Urban History,'' (1994), 21#1 pp.&nbsp;7–19.
* McManus, Ruth, and Philip J. Ethington, "Suburbs in transition: new approaches to suburban history," ''Urban History,'' Aug 2007, Vol. 34 Issue 2, pp 317–337
* [[Clay McShane|McShane, Clay]]. "The State of the Art in North American Urban History," ''Journal of Urban History'' (2006) 32#4 pp 582–597, identifies a loss of influence by such writers as Lewis Mumford, Robert Caro, and Sam Warner, a continuation of the emphasis on narrow, modern time periods, and a general decline in the importance of the field. Comments by Timothy Gilfoyle and Carl Abbott contest the latter conclusion.
*Mohl, Raymond A. "The History of the American City," in William H. Cartwright and Richard L. Watson Jr. eds., ''Reinterpretation of American History and Culture'' (1973)  pp 165–205, overview of historiography
* Montoya, María E. "From Homogeneity to Complexity: Understanding the Urban West." ''Western Historical Quarterly'' 42.3 (2011): 344–348. [https://www.jstor.org/stable/westhistquar.42.3.0344 in JSTOR]
* Nickerson, Michelle. "Beyond Smog, Sprawl, and Asphalt: Developments in the Not-So-New Suburban History," ''Journal of Urban History'' (2015) 41#1 pp 171–180. covers 1934 to 2011. DOI: 10.1177/0096144214551724.
* Rabinowitz, Howard N., and James Michael Russell. "What Urban History Can Teach Us About the South and the South Can Teach Us About Urban History." ''Georgia Historical Quarterly'' (1989) 73#1 pp.&nbsp;54–66 [https://www.jstor.org/stable/40581930 in JSTOR]
* Schlesinger, Arthur M. "The City in American History," ''Mississippi Valley Historical Review'' (1940) 27#1 pp.&nbsp;43–66 [https://www.jstor.org/stable/1896571 in JSTOR] influential manifesto calling for an urban interpretation of all of American history
* Seligman, Amanda I. "Urban History Encyclopedias: Public, Digital, Scholarly Projects." ''Public Historian'' (2013) 35#2 pp: 24–35.
* Sies, Mary Corbin.  "North American urban history: the everyday politics and spatial logics of metropolitan life." ''Urban History Review'' 32.1 (2003): 28–42. [https://www.erudit.org/revue/uhr/2003/v32/n1/1015740ar.pdf online]
* Stave, Bruce M., ed. ''The making of urban history: Historiography through oral history'' (1977), interviews with leading scholars, previously published in ''Journal of Urban History''
* {{citation |series=Exchange Bibliography |issn=0010-9959 |publisher=Council of Planning Librarians |location=US |author= Wakstein, Allen M. |number=897 |title=Bibliography of Urban History |url=https://archive.org/details/bibliographyofur897waks |via=Internet Archive |year= 1975
}} {{free access}}

===Anthologies of scholarly articles===
* Callow, Alexander B., Jr., ed. ''American Urban History: An Interpretive Reader with Commentaries'' (3rd ed. 1982) 33 topical essays by scholars
* Chudacoff, Howard et al. eds. ''Major Problems in American Urban and Suburban History'' (2004)
* Corey, Steven H.,  and Lisa Krissoff Boehm, eds. ''The American Urban Reader: History and Theory'' (2010); 36 essays by experts [https://www.routledge.com/textbooks/9780415803984 see website]
* Goldfield, David. ed. ''Encyclopedia of American Urban History'' (2 vol 2006); 1056 pp; [https://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-American-Urban-History-Volume/dp/0761928847/  excerpt and text search]
* Handlin, Oscar, and John Burchard, eds. ''The Historian and the City'' (1963)
* Holli, Melvin G. and Peter D. A. Jones, eds. ''Biographical Dictionary of American Mayors, 1820-1980: Big City Mayors'' (1981), essays by scholars on the most important mayors of Baltimore, Boston, Buffalo, Chicago, Cincinnati, Cleveland, Detroit, Los Angeles, Milwaukee, New Orleans, New York, Philadelphia, San Francisco, and St. Louis.
* Shumsky, Larry. ''Encyclopedia of Urban America: The Cities and Suburbs'' (2 vol 1998)
* Wakstein, Allen M., ed. ''The Urbanization of America: An Historical Anthology'' (1970) 510 pp; 37 topical essays by scholars

===Primary sources===
* Glaab, Charles N., ed. ''The American city: a documentary history'' (1963) 491pp; selected primary documents
* Jackson, Kenneth T. and David S. Dunbar, eds. ''Empire City: New York Through the Centuries'' (2005), 1015 pages of excerpts [https://www.amazon.com/Empire-City-York-Through-Centuries/dp/0231109091/ excerpt]
* Pierce, Bessie Louise, ed. ''As Others See Chicago: Impressions of Visitors, 1673-1933'' (1934)
* Still, Bayrd, ed. ''Mirror for Gotham: New York as Seen by Contemporaries from Dutch Days to the Present'' (New York University Press, 1956) [https://www.questia.com/library/97287805/mirror-for-gotham-new-york-as-seen-by-contemporaries online edition]

==External links==
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20150924052326/https://www.h-net.org/~urban/ H-URBAN, daily email discussion group on urban history]
* [https://archive.today/20130101065944/https://scale.cs.uoguelph.ca/history/urban/mod01.html Gilbert A. Stelter, "Introduction to the Study of Urban History" (1996)]
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20150312054102/https://uha.udayton.edu/ The Urban History Association]
* [https://juh.sagepub.com/ ''Journal of Urban History'']

{{US history}}

[[Category:Local history]]
[[Category:Urban planning]]
[[Category:Economic history of the United States]]
[[Category:Social history of the United States]]
[[Category:Histories of cities in the United States]]
[[Category:History of the United States by topic]]