Since the late nineteenth century, technology has progressed at accelerating rates, and never moreso than in the last 15 years. Remember those clunky cell phones and giant computers everyone had back in the 1990s? Did anyone think "wearable" tech would ever be a thing then? Probably not. 

Given how quickly our tech seems to evolve now, you may have a hard time getting your students to appreciate the genius of some of the inventions of the Gilded Age. The key will be establishing the link between the technology that is now at your students' fingertips and the precursors that made it all possible. If they understand that without X there could never have been Y, they may find these early innovations more exciting.