The History of American Technology -- Fall 1998
	Grading -- Sample Final (non-essay)

Preindustrial America?

16. T F Artisans enjoyed the highest social status and standard of living among those who lived in the cities
17. T F Generally, less well-to-do people owned fewer tools and often bought more goods than the more affluent folk in the cash economy
18. T F Most work was 'bespoken', which means artisans tended to stay busy all the time and generally used any slow times to build up stocks of finished goods
19. T F Most families on farms maintained strong division of labor based on sex: men took care of all food production and processing -- women cooked, cleaned the house, and tended children's needs
20. T F Women -- in town and on the farm -- most often were responsible for work that was central to the economic success of a family

The role of women in the preindustrial economy?

21. T F Women tended to work primarily in the secondary economic sectors, that is they took care of the finishing activities associated with farming and maintenance of a household
22. T F Women often worked on farms, but seldom had any role in the operation of an artisan's shop
23. T F Women often engaged in work that produced goods for sale in the cash economy -- more often than the men in many farm families
24. T F Women took primary responsibility for nursing and for tending to the dead
25. T F Most women spent the greatest part of each day engaged in caring for children

Attitudes of preindustrial artisans toward work?

26. T F Artisans tended to take frequent breaks for games, drinking, and snacks
27. T F Most artisans sought to build up stocks of goods for sale during the winter months
28. T F Most refused to work everyday and often took holidays when they felt they had produced enough
29. T F Most welcomed the coming of the textile factories as an opportunity for higher wages
30. T F Prior to the coming of factories there were no trades that practiced division of labor

The early industrial revolution (before 1860)?

31. T F Effectively, in entering factory production of textiles, American manufacturers followed the British models in establishing factory layouts, recruiting a workforce, and in defining their markets
32. T F Americans, as compared to British and European competitors, tended to excel at producing the higher quality, more reliable goods
33. T F The 'borrowing' of British railroad technology (1830s) offers a prime example to illustrate how quickly Americans tended to diverge from European models in their approaches to technology development
34. T F During this period, American iron masters tended to be much more aggressive and willing to innovate than the iron masters in England
35. T F By the end of this period (1850s), the development of special purpose machine tools represented the one area in which British and European manufacturers recognized a clear American superiority

Technology and the Second Industrial Revolution?

36. T F Edison championed AC (alternating current) against the Westinghouse proposal for DC (direct current), and the Edison system won the battle.
37. T F The chemical industry was slow to modernize at any point in the 19th century, and we can attribute that to a lack of basic scientific research in most chemical fields
38. T F The early inventors of internal combustion engines (Lenoir (1859) and Otto (1876)) were trying to develop stationary engines to replace the steam engine as a power source for factories and industry
39. T F Many criticize corporate research labs for stifling innovation -- concentrating on protecting markets rather than on developing new products.
40. T F Actually, the great technical problem with early telephone systems wasn't with the phone itself. The greatest technical barrier to national networks was in the transmission over wires.

19th-century attitudes toward the industrialization?

41. T F The agrarian (Jeffersonian) ideal held that America should avoid all involvement with industrialization
42. T F The American belief that work brings dignity and builds character (the Franklin view) has also held out the promise that work will create social and economic mobility.
43. T F While European social critics were beginning to condemn industrialization (1820s and 1830s), most American observers still believed Americans were improving on nature in their industrial enterprises.
44. T F By the later 19th century (1870s) many Americans had come to doubt the moral value of factory work.
45. T F One of the most important social and cultural consequences of industrialization in the late 19th century appeared in the idea of a separation between "work" and "leisure."

Household technology and women in the workforce in the 19th and 20th centuries?

46. T F Overall, changes in technology have provided the most powerful force allowing women to enter the workforce in new job areas and job classifications -- changing technology has traditionally paved the way for women
47. T F The "traditional" housewife of the late 19th and early 20th centuries was primarily responsible for producing goods in what economists describe as 'primary' sectors
48. T F The coming of the automobile and trucks relieved women of some important burdens as household managers as this new form of transportation allowed merchants the ability to offer delivery services for the first time
49. T F The "Doctrine of Separate Spheres" refers to the principles that governed the relationships between the work of women and the work of men in the preindustrial world of farmers and craft artisans
50. T F Overall, household technology has tended to add 'chores' to the housewife's day while at the same time eliminating those chores that were done by servants and others in the family in the preindustrial household

Technology and warfare?

51. T F The supposed advantage of Eli Whitney's muskets lay in the ability for an army to repair weapons quickly and cheaply
52. T F During the American Civil War, the South enjoyed a significant advantage in the possession of key manufacturing capabilities, especially those related to railroad technology and the production of heavy artillery
53. T F World War I stalled the development of aviation because the priorities for war production caused scarcity in the availability of important materials
54. T F The strategic bombing campaign of World War II emphasized precision strikes targeted only at sites that were directly related to military objectives -- World War II strategists never undertook bombing intended to produce mass destruction
55. T F In proposing that NASA send an American to the moon, John Kennedy was trying to avoid a weapons race with the Soviet Union. Kennedy was strongly committed to eliminating international competition in space

The New Factory?

56. T F A major objective of the management in the "new factories" was to increase productivity
57. T F The development of Scientific Management, Motion Studies, and the Personnel movement were clear responses to difficulties in keeping factory workers productive
58. T F The proponents of Scientific Management believed in getting more efficiency and more work from the workers
59. T F The leaders of the Motion Study movement wanted to get more work from the workers by easing strain and making the working environment more relaxing
60. T F The personnel movement sought to create worker involvement and commitment to the company as a means to increase productivity

Mechanization of sight and sound?

61. T F Typically, the development of the technology of mass media (radio, TV, film, etc.) has been controlled by a very few corporations that have tended to emphasize maximum profits rather than rapid technical development
62. T F In Edison's invention of the phonograph, the great obstacle to creating the first working prototype was the difficulty of developing the electrical and electronic circuits
63. T F Typically, the inventors and early developers of new mass media have tended to do a very poor job of envisioning how their customers and audiences would use the new technology
64. T F Both radio and television actually proved rather slow in moving to market. In both cases, workable technologies were available for years before any significant commercial success developed
65. T F Very often, in the film industry innovation has been driven by competition from other entertainment technologies

Automobility, the auto industry, and the development of American transportation?

66. T F The automobile first entered the American market as a luxury item -- a rich man's plaything
67. T F Henry Ford was not the first manufacturer in the auto industry to attempt high volume production as a way to achieve economies of scale and lower priced cars
68. T F The Model T was the last of Henry Ford's personal triumphs in automobile production. By the time he shut down production of the T (1927), the company was losing money and continued to do so for most of the time until his death (1946)
69. T F The building of the Interstate Highway System (begun in 1956) marked the first time the Federal government had gotten involved in building roads and highways for automobiles
70. T F Development of the airline industry was greatly promoted and facilitated by government sponsored R&D

Great Depression and the automobile industry?

71. T F Undoubtedly, the employment opportunities created in the auto industry helped lessen the severity and the depth of the Great Depression of the 1930s
72. T F The Technocracy movement that appeared during the Great Depression (1930s) intended to return Americans to the pastoral way of life we associate with the Jeffersonian ideals (the best citizens are yeomen farmers in touch with the land)
73. T F Process technology innovation (changes in factory equipment and organization) worked to increase unemployment during the 1920s and 1930s
74. T F During the 1930s, many Americans came to believe new technology contributed to problems such as the unemployment that came with the Great Depression
75. T F One of the economic problems associated the auto industry of the 1920s was that it had only very limited effects in creating (or eliminating) jobs in other industrial sectors

Development of mass culture?

76. T F The very first commercial markets for movies were among working men in poor neighborhoods
77. T F Because of the expense involved, only the major film studios could afford to develop the 'talkie' (1927)
78. T F The 'talking' movie was relatively slow to take hold. It required more than 20 years for just more than half of all movie theaters to be wired for sound
79. T F The nature of radio and TV as media made it possible for a very few corporations to dominate the development of the technology and the programming
80. T F Both radio and TV pioneers tried very hard to develop programming that was 'different' from what was available anywhere else

Development of the airline industry?

81. T F It took several years for the Wright Brothers to get most people to believe they had done anything significant. Even the government refused to take any official notice of their 1903 flights at Kitty Hawk
82. T F Airmail proved immediately profitable, and in the 1920s carrying mail as contractors became the first free market success for the aircraft industry
83. T F Because of the number of surplus aircraft after World War I (ended 1918) it was very easy to get into the flying business but very difficult for manufacturers of new aircraft to survive the 1920s
84. T F American aircraft builders were the first to produce a true jet aircraft for airline use (1950s)
85. T F The DC-3 proved very successful as a military transport, but never really worked for commercial airlines

Development of Nuclear Power?

86. T F The Government has never really supported commercial nuclear power
87. T F Curiously, Americans expressed very little fear of nuclear power in the 1950s and 1960s
88. T F The economics of nuclear power promised a great deal, but the safety made the technology unacceptable
89. T F The commercial industry was built on the success of the Navy's nuclear program
90. T F The U.S. kept licensing and building new reactors through the 1970s and 1980s despite public reaction to Three-Mile Island

Farming, mining, and lumber?

91. T F The development of steam tractors (1870s) had little impact on farm productivity
92. T F The timber industry in this country has always been focused either in the northeast (New England) or the Pacific Northwest -- no other regions have ever developed significant timber resources
93. T F The great gains in modern agricultural productivity have come from the mechanization of farms (application of power)
94. T F Mining was fully mechanized before World War II, and mining productivity increased only slightly in the Post War period
95. T F Actually, farm productivity has increased only slowing since World War II

Postwar economy of the 1940s - 1970s?

96. T F The housing shortage after World War II was artificial -- created simply to support the construction industry
97. T F In the world of medicine, pharmaceuticals represent the area where government sponsored R&D has done the least to promote the development of new products
98. T F In the immediate Postwar period -- 1945 -1950 -- the computer industry experienced enormous growth and established itself very quickly as independent of government research money
99. T F The price of plastics dropped sharply in the immediate Postwar period
100. T F At least in part, government support of NASA in the 1960s was prompted by the desire to avoid unemployment in the aerospace industry