Glitter & Gloom: Gilded Age America

In the years following the Civil War, U.S. wealth, power, and boundaries grew at fantastic rates.  But there was a dark underside to this growth.  The new money, land, and power were distributed inequitably, leading to stark disparities between rich and poor, black and white, American and Indigenous, men and women, native-born and immigrant, the powerful and the masses.  Society's gilded exterior shone brightly, but it was thin.  Beneath it was the rot of poverty, corruption, and bigotry, and the quest for reform.