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Victorian Society
Victorian Technological advances
Queen Victoria reigned from 1837 to 1901 and it was a time of great change. In 1851, the Great Exhibition was held in Hyde Park where technological advances were on display beneath the huge iron and glass construction of the Crystal Palace. It was a time of advancement toward a technological future; the railway flourished and ironed out regional differences and patterns of settlement with cheap efficient travel. There was communication by telegraph, the first car was driven and the prospect of electric lighting for all became a reality. These advancements and more occurred in Victoria's reign giving hope to many of a golden future. In 1867, American writer Ralph Waldo Emerson praised the technological advances of the time: ' Who would live in the stone age, or the bronze, or the iron, or the lacustrine? Who does not prefer the age of steel, of gold, of coal, petroleum, cotton, steam, electricity, and the spectroscope?
Victorian Cities
However, the hardships of the time were known by all, the poor suffered them and the rich ignored them. The populations of cities were in rapid growth as people found that the rural areas were less able to support them and so moved to the cities where the industrial revolution had taken root. In 1842 an industrialist said that a stranger passing through the towns 'cannot contemplate these crowded hives without feelings of anxiety and apprehension... the population is hourly increasing in strength and breadth. It is an aggregate of masses.' the cities were often very dreary as well as this they also suffered with slums, polluted air and thick pea souper smog.
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