First we need or understand just what the American Dream was. In the 1940s we were made up of three basic groups, small family farms and their workers. small and large manufacturing and their workers, and the general service industry, plumbers, salesman, construction etc.
Since the very first settlers, the dream was, a piece of land, a peaceful life, family, and a home, and most important to live free, to make your own choices, and your own decisions, to succeed or fail by your own hand. A free person upon the land. This was not only the American dream but was very obtainable by most free men and women, with self reliance, dedication, responsibility and hard work. And so it was up until the industrial revolution beginning in the late 1800s. It is true there were a few cattle barons here and there with their huge mansions, and great plantation houses spaced throughout the east and south but, for the most part, the Americans actually lived the American dream, relying on no one but them selves. Few even saw these huge mansions or paid them any attention when they did , except as you would any other anomaly or curiosity.
The arrival of the industrial revolution in the 1850s divided America into two distinct groups, rural, and urban. The agrarian section including small town dwellers, earned about $40 to about $400 per year, the greater amount earned by city and town dwellers, and merchants. By 1860 the industrial revolution was in full swing, and city workers were earning about $800.
At this very point in our history is where the American dream, became not something hacked out of the earth with ones own hard work. This is the point at which the "American Dream"became for sale.
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