Text 2

Both the number and the percentage of people in the United States involved in nonagricultural pursuits expanded rapidly during the half century following the Civil War, with some of the most dramatic increases occurring in the domains of transportation, manufacturing, and trade and distribution. The development of the railroad and telegraph systems during the middle third of the nineteenth century led to significant improvements in the speed, volume, and regularity of shipments and communications, making possible a fundamental transformation in the production and distribution of goods.

In agriculture, the transformation was marked by the emergence of the grain elevators, the cotton presses, the warehouses, and the commodity exchanges that seemed to so many of the nation’s farmers the visible sign of a vast conspiracy against them. In manufacturing, the transformation was marked by the emergence of a “new factory system” in which plants became larger, more complex, and more systematically organized and managed. And in distribution, the transformation was marked by the emergence of the jobber, the wholesaler, and the mass retailer. These changes radically altered the nature of work during the half century between 1870 and 1920.

To be sure, there were still small workshops, where skilled craftspeople manufactured products ranging from newspapers to cabinets to plumbing fixtures. There were the sweatshops in city tenements, where groups of men and women in household settings manufactured clothing or cigars on a piecework basis. And there were factories in occupations such as metalwork where individual contractors presided over what were essentially handicraft proprietorships that coexisted within a single building. But as the number of wage earners in manufacturing rose from 2.7 million in 1880 to 4.5 million in 1900 to 8.4 million in 1920, the number of huge plants like the Baldwin Locomotive Works in Philadelphia burgeoned, as did the size of the average plant. (The Baldwin Works had 600 employees in 1855, 3,000 in 1875, and 8,000 in 1900.) By 1920, at least in the northeastern United States where most of the nation’s manufacturing wage earners were concentrated, three-quarters of those worked in factories with more than 100 employees and 30 percent worked in factories with more than 1,000 employees.

26. What can be inferred from the passage about the agricultural sector of the economy after the Civil War?

A. New technological developments had little effect on farmers.

B. The percentage of the total population working in agriculture declined.

C. Many farms destroyed in the war were rebuilt after the war.

D. Farmers achieved new prosperity because of better rural transportation.

27. Which of the following was NOT mentioned as part of the “new factory system?”

A. A change in the organization of factories.

B. A growth in the complexity of factories.

C. An increase in the size of factories.

D. An increase in the cost of manufacturing industrial products.

28. Which of the following statements about manufacturing before 1870 can be inferred from the passage?

A. Most manufacturing activity was highly organized.

B. Most manufacturing occurred in relatively small plants.

C. The most commonly manufactured goods were cotton presses.

D. Manufacturing and agriculture each made up about half of the nation’s economy.

29. The author mentions the Baldwin Locomotive Works in Paragraph 3 because it was

A. a well-known metal-works

B. the first plant of its kind in Philadelphia

C. typical of the large factories that were becoming more common

D. typical of factories that consisted of a single building

30. The word “presided over” in Paragraph 3 are closest in meaning to

A. managed B. led to

C. worked in D. produced

26.【答案】D

【解析】这是一道句意理解题。作者用这句话举例来说明上文所提出的现象，因此答案应该回到上句进行寻找，“Ayearagotheendseemednear.”(一年前，报业岌岌可危)一句提到了报业的状况。因此，题干所问句子实际是用比喻说法(为自己的命运编年记事)表明包括《旧金山纪事》在内的报纸身处绝境，命运堪忧，故D项符合题意，为正确答案。

A项在原文并未提及，属于无中生有;B项中的“国家补贴”在首段倒数第三句有所涉及，但这只是美国联邦贸易委员会探讨拯救报业的一项措施，内容是“国家要不要资助报业”，而非是“报业没能得到国家资助”，故是干扰项;C项源自首段倒数第四句，错误与B项完全相同，也只是联邦贸易委员会现探讨的一项措施，内容是“报业要不要成为慈善机构”，而非“报业不是慈善机构”。

27.【答案】B

【解析】这是一道推断题。根据题干关键词“refuseddeliverytodistantsuburbs”可以定位到文章第三段第五句“Somepaperseven…refusedelivery…”。由于题目问的是报社这样做的原因，题目并未直接给出，需要通过上下文进行推测。第四句说“报纸内容缩水，价格提高”，第六句总结性地说“Thesedesperatemeasures…”由此可见，前面提到的“拒绝投递到郊区”和“报纸内容缩水”一样，都是报社采取的措施中的一种，后者显然是想减少成本，考虑到这些措施的共同目的，“拒绝投递到郊区”应该也是处于对成本的考虑，故答案选B。

A项与原文内容相反，原文是“报纸内容缩水，但读者却要付费更多”，故不正确;C项内容文中并未涉及，属于无中生有;D项也是无中生有，文中并未提及订阅者是否有投诉行为。

28.【答案】C

【解析】这是一道推断题。根据题干关键信息“Japanesenewspapersaremuchmorestable”定位到原文第四段的尾句“Notsurprisingly…”。但因为该题目问的是原因，且定位到原文的信息是段落最后一句，所以应该从上文找寻原因：本段第二句提到“美国报业的畸形发展是因为它过多地依赖广告收益”，第三句以87%的具体数据来补充说明，第四句提到日本的数据仅为35%。通过两国的数据比较可以看出日本报业对广告的依赖度显然比美国小的多，由此带来的结果是题干提出的结果“难怪，日本报业更稳定”。反过来理解，日本报业更稳定的原因就是“对广告的依赖小”，因此C项正确。

就日本的报业状况而言，原文的信息仅提到其广告收入的比例，及由此带来的稳定性，选项A、B、D的内容并未提及，属于无中生有。

29.【答案】A

【解析】这是一道段落推断题。题干所问是最后一整段的信息，因此这里采用判断题的做法来做，即把四个选项与文中信息进行比对。根据最后一段第一句话中“butmuchofthedamagehasbeenconcentratedinareaswherenewspapersareleastdistinctive”可知，“最受重创的是报社中最不具特色的部门”，所以与众不同对报纸来说是至关重要的，故A项正确。

文章第五句提出“Newspapersarelesscompleteasaresult.”，由此可知，报纸完整性的丧失是报业危机带来的结果，而非报业危机的原因，故B项不对;根据第四句“Foreignbureaushavebeensavagelycutoff.”可知，当前的报纸行业中，驻外机构已被裁减，因此C项可以排除;文中第二句“Carandfilmreviewershavegone.”确实提到汽车和电影评论栏目已经消失，但并未提及读者们对这两个栏目的反应，因此D项不对，属于推断过度。

30.【答案】A

【解析】这是一道文章主旨题，需要把握全文的信息，重点关注文章首尾段落信息。纵观全文，首段提出“人们曾经对报纸消亡的担忧”;第二段讲“美国报业的复苏”;第三段讲“报业采取的措施”;第四段讲“报业收入日趋平衡”;第五段讲“报业的变化并非坏事”，所以本文主要探讨的是在经历了危机之后，报业的复苏和平衡，因此答案A是正确的。

根据文章首段尾句“Butthediscussionsnowseemoutofdate.”可知，首段前面提到的关于报业身处绝境岌岌可危等的讨论都是不合时宜的了，因此本文的主题是积极的，而非“报业的消亡”，故B、D可以排除;根据第三段首句“Ithasnotbeenmuchfun”可知，C项过于乐观，言过其实，也不正确。