Essay On The Gilded Age

165 Words1 Pages
The word gilded refers to something thinly covered in gold. Mark Twain referred to the late 1800s as the Gilded Age due to what it appeared to be, a time of great success for many but underneath a time of corruption in businesses and the government. The 1870s-1890s was a time of poverty, opportunity, and disaster. The growing comfort of middle-class life during the Gilded Age led many to fear that American men were losing their manliness. Many middle-class Americans embraced formerly taboo violent sports like boxing and football. Others called for military action, seeing war as a time of great opportunity to prove American manhood. Employment for middle class men took a turn from outdoor manual labor to deskbound office work. The gilded age