President Encyclopedia 1829-1849

President Encyclopedia 1829-1849 — page 3
6 A Time of Change A man is photographed by R W Johnson studios in Pittsburgh on February 16 1909 The photo was printed from a process using four separate negatives The inset print also of Pittsburgh was taken in 1849 As a result the total land area of the The growth in the urban population United States in 1849 was nearly 3 million square miles 7 8 square kilometers That was more than three times what it had been in 1789 when the Constitution went into effect In addition the winning of the Mexican War 1846 1848 brought America a vast region from which the states of California and New Mexico as well as Arizona Colorado Nevada and Utah would later be created America’s population too had greatly increased In 1789 the population was a little less than 4 million people By 1849 it had increased almost six times to about 23 million people Most Americans still lived on farms Only about 15 percent lived in cities but that was a big increase from earlier times In 1789 there were no cities in America with a population of more than 100,000 people By 1849 there were five New York City New York Philadelphia Pennsylvania Baltimore Maryland Boston Massachusetts and New Orleans Louisiana was partly the result of immigration to the United States Earlier in the 1800s the rate of immigration was very low But in the 1830s about 500,000 people settled in America In the 1840s the number rose to 1 5 million In 1850 alone about 370,000 people came The majority emigrated from Ireland Germany and Great Britain Kellogg depicted this bombardment of Vera Cruz during the Mexican War on March 25 1847