<P> Western inventors and industrialists transformed the West in the late 19th century and early 20th century . The American Thomas Edison pioneered electricity and motion picture technology . Other American inventors, the Wright brothers, completed the first successful airplane flight in 1903 . The first automobiles were also invented in this period . Petroleum became an important commodity after the discovery it could be used to power machines . Steel was developed in Britain by Henry Bessemer . This very strong metal, combined with the invention of elevators, allowed people to construct very tall buildings, called skyscrapers . In the late 19th century, the Italian Guglielmo Marconi was able to communicate across distances using radio . In 1876, the first telephone was invented by Alexander Graham Bell, a British expatriate living in America . Many became very wealthy from this Second Industrial Revolution, including the American entrepreneurs Andrew Carnegie and John D. Rockefeller . Unions continued to fight for the rights of workers, and by 1914 laws limiting working hours and outlawing child labor had been passed in many Western countries . </P> <P> Culturally, the English - speaking nations were in the midst of the Victorian Era, named for Britain's queen . In France, this period is called the Belle Epoque, a period of many artistic and cultural achievements . The suffragette movement began in this period, which sought to gain voting rights for women, with New Zealand and Australian parliaments granting women's suffrage in the 1890s . However, by 1914, only a dozen U.S. states had given women this right, although women were treated more and more as equals of men before the law in many countries . </P> <P> Cities grew as never before between 1870 and 1914 . This led at first to unsanitary and crowded living conditions, especially for the poor . However, by 1914, municipal governments were providing police and fire departments and garbage removal services to their citizens, leading to a drop in death rates . Unfortunately, pollution from burning coal and wastes left by thousands of horses that crowded the streets worsened the quality of life in many urban areas . Paris, lit up by gas and electric light, and containing the tallest structure in the world at the time, the Eiffel Tower, was often looked to as an ideal modern city, and served as a model for city planners around the world . </P> <P> Following the American Civil War, great changes occurred in the United States . After the war, the former Confederate States were put under federal occupation and federal lawmakers attempted to gain equality for blacks by outlawing slavery and giving them citizenship . After several years, however, Southern states began rejoining the Union as their populations pledged loyalty to the United States government, and in 1877 Reconstruction as this period was called, came to an end . After being re-admitted to the Union, Southern lawmakers passed segregation laws and laws preventing blacks from voting, resulting in blacks being regarded as second - class citizens for decades to come . </P>

What was the long lasting contribution of rome to western civilization