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The period from the last years of the Gilded Age in the 1890s and early

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1900s to the late 1920s is called the Progressive Era it was a time when

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Americans decided to try out a new insurance company [Woman wearing progressive era shirt appears]

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hey who can deny the appeal of flow okay it was actually a time when Americans

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decided to try and do something about all the social issues that had been [Dirty clothing by foot of the bed]

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piling up like dirty socks in the corner let's say let's count them there was

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women's lack of rights workers lack of rights unsafe and unsanitary cities

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obscenely rich bazillion eras with poorly paid servants racial inequality [Social issues on piece of paper]

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environmental destruction and rampant alcoholism and a whole bunch of other

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corruption things that we won't even get into here so yep America had more issues

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than that guy on our block who sells sculptures made from his own fingernails [Man stood beside fingernail sculptures]

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okay so maybe we bought one it'll be worth something someday on you just wait

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and see anyway for most of history America had had a serious case of denial

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wasn't like from the center of Egypt not that now you know how most houses have a [Sign for denial appears on highway]

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broken stair or a leaking faucet somewhere and everyone in the house [Faucet leaking water]

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comes up with ridiculous workarounds like jumping over the stair or keeping

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water bottles under the sink and then everyone gets so used to it that people

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who want to actually fix the stairs or faucets just sound like complainers well

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all of America's issues were like the broken stairs and faucets of the day at

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least until the Progressive Era came in like an irate handyman because everybody [Handy man appears]

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was used to the problems early activists came off as complainers and nit pickers

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a lot of them were called muckrakers because they were bringing in ugly truth

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to the surface however instead of shutting up muckrakers just kept getting [Man raking muck outside white house]

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louder and louder eventually politicians listened and

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became reformers who dramatically changed American society thank you

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newspaper headline yeah anything get all that muck off their lawns is worth doing

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however these changes weren't always all that cool some progressives fought for

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the rights of the poor in a way that was downright insulting and there was no [Newspaper with headline poor people are stupid]

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getting around the ugly undercurrent of racism and classism that had infected

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the progressive movement for example even if [Man protesting for the poor]

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progressives fought for the right to the white working poor many still wanted to

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attack or remove non-white people and non-white culture we wonder what slow

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would have to say about that yeah well probably something harsh but

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funny hello just gets how to speak to people [Flo approaches protestor]

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