Rise of Mass Society

Rise of Mass Society Mass society arose in the Gilded Age in many ways. People moved back to the cities for many reasons. Farmers were forced to relocate because of the production of heavy machinery, the educational, medical care, and just sheer leisure that the city could offer. With the additional people who had moved into the city also came concern for sanitation. The population of New York City doubling each decade it created for an unsanitary condition as the infrastructure was not adequate to sustain the amount of people living in the cities. By the end of the 19th century the population had gotten to four million. Such extraordinary human overcrowding shared with a simple infrastructure made for the best conditions for an intense rise in widespread disease. Mosquito and tick borne diseases like malaria along with cholera, typhoid, typhus, and yellow fever festered. The city's death rate increase rapidly, and children died in great amounts. The city seemed to be coming apart. New York City's substructure was dependent on horses. Between 100,000 and 200,000 horses was living in the city at any time (2008). Each horse gave off 24 pounds of feces and many quarts of urine daily. Even with the presence of animals, the city had no efficient street-cleaning techniques. Horse carcasses presented additional problems with the street cleaning, as the carcass can weigh as much as 1,200 pounds, much heavier than any person can lift and move (2008). When a horse did die it would have been left to rot then moved when it was manageable. With the invention of the electric and trolley cars the need for horse drawn transportation lessened. Eventually the horse would not be wanted within the city as a mode of transportation as the cable car and the electric trolley cars entered the city. The advantages assured by automobile supporters appeared to be realized. Streets were cleaner, pollution from manure and the diseases created were diminished, goods were