Ana Corral P.

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Chapter 15: The Ferment of Reform and Culture (1790-1860)
Second Great Awakening: This was the second religious revival in the United States in which masses
of people would gather to pray and many souls were "saved". The Methodists and Baptists became the
most abundant religion from heavy recruiting. The Second Great Awakening renewed religion as the
center of American culture and redefined American religions much as it had done a hundred years
previous by reaching out to the masses.
Peter Cartwright/Charles Finney: They were both influential members of the Second Great
Awakening. Peter was an uneducated Methodist who converted thousands of souls with his powerful
speeches. Charles was a former lawyer who became and evangelist and held huge crowd spellbound
with his powerful message, and led massive revivals in New York with his brand of old-time-religion.
Both of these men were key contributors to the second Great Awakening with their distinct methods of
rallying people for religious revival. They were two of many important members of the religious
movement and influenced many to change their lives.
Burned-Over District: A term that refers religious revivals to western New York. Puritan sermonizers
were preaching “hell-fire and damnation." Joseph Smith, who claimed to have had a revelation from
angel, established the Mormon religion and they faced much persecution from the people and were
eventually forced to move west. (Salt Lake City) After the difficult journey they greatly improved their
land through wise forms of irrigation. The establishment and persecution of the Mormon religion revisited
old themes that were around from the original colonists. The Mormons migration westward brought new
prosperity to the unpopulated west and has become a prominent part in American society today.
Joseph Smith: Founded the Mormon religion after reporting that he was visited by an angel and given
golden plates in 1840; the plates, when deciphered, brought about the Church of Latter Day Saints and
the Book of Mormon; he ran into opposition from Ohio, Illinois, and Missouri when he attempted to
spread the Mormon beliefs, but was killed by non believer. Smith establishment of the Mormon faith
started a movement within America of values including no drinking, gambling, and an unorthodox view of
marriage. His sacrifice for his religious beliefs is a symbol of what America was built on back in the
colonial days.
Latter-Day Saints (Mormons): church founded by Joseph Smith in 1830 with headquarters in Salt Lake
City, Utah. Thought Smith was like Jesus and was sent to save the Indians.
Brigham Young: A Mormon leader that led his oppressed followers to Utah in 1846 to escape
persecution. Under Young's management, his Mormon community became a prosperous frontier
theocracy and a cooperative commonwealth. He became the territorial governor in 1850. Unable to
control the hierarchy of Young, Washington sent a federal army in 1857 against the harassing Mormons.
Brigham Young led the Mormons essentially to their freedom y establishing a home in Utah. However,
his untraditional beliefs caused many controversies and forced Washington to march a military
campaign in order to contain the Young who was becoming to powerful.
Noah Webster: Born in Connecticut and educated at Yale, Webster lived from1758-1843. Called
“Schoolmaster of the Republic.” Wrote reading primers and texts for school use. He was most famous
for his dictionary. His dictionary, first published in 1828, standardized the English language in America.
His "reading lessons," used by millions of children, promoted patriotism.
Dorothea Dix: (1802-1887) a tireless reformer, Dorothea worked mightily to improve the treatment of
the mentally ill. Would report the status of treatment of inmates in jails and insane asylums to Congress.
She was a teacher and Civil War nurse best known for her work with the mentally ill.
American Temperance Society: Americans such as Lyman Beecher, who was a Connecticut minister,
had started to lecture his fellow citizens against all use of liquor in 1825. The American Temperance
Society was formed in 1826 and benefited from a renewed interest in religion and morality. Within 12
years it claimed more than 8,000 local groups and over 1,500,000 members. By 1839, 18 temperance
journals were being published. Simultaneously, many Protestant churches were beginning to promote
temperance.
Lucretia Mott: Leader of the movement to grant American women the right to vote, along with Elizabeth
Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony. Mott was instrumental in bringing together men and women for a
national convention in Seneca Falls, New York, in 1848. The result was a sort of "improved" Declaration
of Independence, which included the phrase "all men and women are created equal." She also spoke
out against slavery. A Quaker, Lucretia was an abolitionist, social reformer, and proponent of women’s
rights.
Elizabeth Cady Stanton: founder with Susan B Anthony of the National Woman Suffrage Association.
Wrote the “Declaration of Sentiments” for the Seneca Falls Convention of 1848. Was the beginning of
the women’s civil rights movement.
Susan B. Anthony: A Quaker-reared militant lecturer for women's rights. She became such a
conspicuous advocate of female rights that women everywhere that held similar beliefs were called
“Suzy B's.” Was the most influential advocate of women's rights in American history.
Seneca Falls Convention (1848): In the spirit of the declaration of Independence declared that all men
and women are created equal. One resolution demanded the ballot for women. This meeting launched
the modern women's rights movement. A women's rights convention where feminists met and argued
that all men and women are created equal. Demanded voting rights for females. Launches for women's
rights movements it was the 1st big convention for women.
“Declaration of Sentiments:” written by Elizabeth Cady Stanton for the NWSA. “all men and women
are created equal.”
Brook Farm: Oneida from New York practiced free love birth control and the selection of parents for
best offspring. Brook intellectuals committed to transcendentalism. These were some example of the
utopian movement with communist societies in America. Brook Farm was a transcendentalist commune;
an attempt by Thoreau and others to leave society behind.
Oneida Community: founded by John Humphrey Noyes in 1848 in Oneida, New York. The community
believed that Jesus Christ had already returned in the year 70, making it possible for them to bring about
Christ's millennial kingdom themselves, and be free of sin and perfect in this world, not just Heaven (a
belief called Perfectionism). Did the deed with old folk.
John Humphrey Noyes: was an American utopian socialist. He founded the Oneida Community in
1848. He coined the term "free love.”
Utopianism: Various reformers set up communities with equal rights and jobs. Utopian lifestyle. This
idea was taken from manifest destiny, using socialist ideas, trying to remove a capitalist society.
John J. Audubon: 1785 to 1851; He was an artist who specialized in painting wild fowl. He had such
works as Birds of America. Ironically, he shot a lot of birds for sport when he was young. The Audubon
Society for the protection of birds was named after him. His depictions of western wildlife contributed to
the western population movements.
Charles Wilson Peale: (1741-1827). A Marylander who painted 60 portraits of George Washington,
who had around 14 of them.
John Trumbull: John Trumbull was an American artist during the period of the American Revolutionary
War famous for his historical paintings including his Declaration of Independence. Significance- His
declaration of independence picture appears on the reverse of the $2 dollar bill.
Louis Daguerre (daguerreotype): Daguerre discovered that exposing an iodized silver plate in a
camera creates a lasting image if the latent image on the plate is developed and fixed. In 1839 a
description of his daguerreotype process was announced at the Academy of Sciences.
Washington Irving: American writer remembered for the stories "Rip Van Winkle" and "The Legend of
Sleepy Hollow," contained in The Sketch Book (1819-1820).
Transcendentalism: The theory that denounced the usual culture and way of life of the time, arguing
that truth "transcends" the senses, rather than the largely accepted theory of the prevailing theory of
John Locke, that all knowledge comes from the mind though the senses. This movement resulted in part
from a liberalizing of the constricting Puritan theology and was influenced by German romantic
philosophers and the religions of Asia. Writers in New England, especially near Boston, supported this
movement.
Ralph Waldo Emerson/Walt Whitman/Henry David Thoreau: Writers of the Transcendentalist
movement. Emerson the best-known who was trained as a Unitarian minister but became a hailed poet
and philosopher instead. Thoreau was Emerson's close associate and was a poet, a mystic, and a non-
conformist. Whitman was the bold, open collared figure from Brooklyn, famous for his collection of
poems Leaves of Grass. His poems were highly unconventional, romantic, and handled sex with
shocking frankness. These poets were the first of their kind in America and were the leaders of the
Transcendentalist movement
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow: (1803-1882) Harvard professor and poet; “Courtship of Miles
Standish,” “The Song of Hiawatha,” and “Tales of Wayside Inn”a collection of poems which includes
“Paul Revere’s Midnight Ride”
Oliver Wendell Holmes: An anatomy teacher at Harvard Medical School was also a prominent poet,
essayist, novelist, and lecturer. "The Last Leaf" in honor of the last "white Indian" at the Boston Tea
Party, which really applied to himself. Made many contributions to American literature and medicine.
Declared that if the medicine were to be thrown into the sea, humans would be better off and the fish
worse off.
Louisa May Scott: (1832-1882) as an American novelist. She is best known for the novel Little Women,
set in the Alcott family home, Orchard House in Concord, Massachusetts, and published in 1868. This
novel is loosely based on her childhood experiences with her three sisters. She was a transcendentalist.
Emily Dickinson: was an American poet. Born in Amherst, Massachusetts, to a successful family with
strong community ties, she lived a mostly introverted and reclusive life. Although Dickinson was a prolific
private poet, fewer than a dozen of her nearly eighteen hundred poems were published during her
lifetime. Many of her poems deal with themes of death and immortality, two recurring topics in letters to
her friends.
Edgar Allan Poe: 1809–49, American poet, short-story writer, and critic, born in Boston. He is
acknowledged today as one of the most brilliant and original writers in American literature. His skillfully
wrought tales and poems convey with passionate intensity the mysterious, dreamlike, and often
macabre forces that pervaded his sensibility. He is also considered the father of the modern detective
story.
Nathaniel Hawthorne/Herman Melville: Hawthorne’s Scarlett Letter psychological effect of sin on the
guilty conscience. Melville’s Moby Dick was not popular at first but later was looked upon as a
masterpiece. Both reflected the continuing Calvinist obsession with the original sin and struggle between
good and evil.
George Bancroft: He was the secretary of the navy. Took part in the founding of Annapolis naval
academy. The Father of American history because he published six volumes of US history showing
patriotism and nationalism.