The Second Industrial Revolution 753Bohemia and Moravia contrasted sharply with the small-market ways of
Austria and the Hungarian plain. In the Balkans, where major rail lines
were not in place until the late 1880s, poor roads and the daunting moun
tains limited the emergence of vibrant regional market economies. In many
places, mules remained the best way to transport goods. Yet even in over
whelmingly rural Bulgaria, the value of industrial production multiplied by
three times just between 1904 and 1911, and the railway network increased
rapidly after 1880.
Travel and Communications
Electric power led to the construction of modern public transportation
systems, first trams and then subways. Mass transportation transformed
residential patterns in large cities. The London underground railway had
already opened without electricity in 1863, making it possible for employ
ees and workers to live much farther from their jobs. In 1900, the first
Paris subway—the metro—began operation on the right bank of the Seine
River, and other lines soon followed. Four years later, the first sections of
New York City’s subway began operation.
In 1885, Carl Benz (1844-1929), a German engineer, built upon the
invention of the internal combustion engine. He added a primitive carbu
retor and constructed a small automobile. The first automobiles were very
expensive, the tires alone costing more than an average worker’s annual
wages. In 1897, Rudolf Diesel (1858-1913), a German, produced the
first successful engine fueled by kerosene, which could power larger vehi
cles. By the turn of the century, four-cylinder engines powered automo
biles.
Automobile manufacturing quickly became a major catalyst for industrial
growth and the implementation of new production methods, stimulating
the production of steel, aluminum, rubber, and tools. The petroleum indus
try slowly developed, although at the time only the oil reserves in Romania
were known and exploited (the first oil refinery in Europe had been built
there in 1857). Little by little some industrialists and statesmen began to
grasp the economic and strategic significance of oil, particularly after the
discovery in 1908 of rich oil fields in Persia (Iran).
Automobile manufacturers shifted from the limited production of elite
cars, above all, the British Rolls Royce, to less expensive models. Henry Ford
(1863—1947), who began his company in Detroit in 1903, produced more
than 15 million “Model T” Fords, which even some of his own workers could
afford to purchase. Worried by American competition, the French car manu
facturer Louis Renault (1877-1944) looked for ways to cut production
costs. Assembly-line production made it possible to construct cars in seg
ments. Workers mounted components on stationary chassis frames lined up
along the factory floor. They used hand files to shape engine parts for expen
sive cars since interchangeable parts were not yet available. The assembly