American Pageant Chapter 26

Great American Desert

Region between the Missouri River and the Rocky Mountains. Vast domain became accessible to Americans wishing to settle there. This region was called the "Great American Desert" in atlases published between 1820 and 1850, and many people were convinced this land was a Sahara habitable only to Indians. The phrase had been coined by Major Long during his exploration of the middle portion of the Louisiana Purchase region.

"Concentration" policy

The creation of Indian reservations that allowed the government to force tribes into scattered locations, often with land unfitted for agriculture

Sand Creek Massacre (1864)

an incident in the Indian Wars of the United States that occurred when a force of Colorado militia attacked and destroyed a village of friendly Cheyenne and Arapaho encamped in southeastern Colorado Territory, killing and mutilating an Indians, about two-thirds of whom were women and children.

Col. J. M. Chivington

Leader of the Colorado militia, highly anti-Native and had pursued a very aggressive policy against natives, was largely responsible for the Sand Creek Massacre of 180 Native Americans, mostly women and children

Sitting Bull

American Indian medicine man, chief, and political leader of his tribe at the time of the Custer massacre during the Sioux War

Crazy Horse

A chief of the Sioux who resisted the invasion of the Black Hills and joined Sitting Bull in the defeat of General Custer at Little Bighorn

Geronimo

Apache chieftain who raided the white settlers in the Southwest as resistance to being confined to a reservation

Gen. George A. Custer

United States general who was killed along with all his command by the Sioux at the battle of Little Bighorn

Battle of Little Big Horn

A particularly violent example of the warfare between whites and Native Americans in the late nineteenth century, also know as "Custer's Last Stand." In two days, June 25 and 26, 1876, the combined forces of over 2,000 Sioux, Cheyenne, and Arapaho Indians defeated and killed more than 250 U.S. soldiers, including Colonel George Custer. The battle came as the U.S. government tried to compel Native Americans to remain on the reservations and Native Americans tried to defend territory from white gold-seekers. This Indian advantage did not last long, however, as the union of these Indian fighters proved tenuous and the United States Army soon exacted retribution.

Chief Joseph

Leader of Nez Perce. Fled with his tribe to Canada instead of reservations. However, US troops came and fought and brought them back down to reservations

"Ghost Dance"

A ritual the Sioux performed to bring back the buffalo and return the Native American tribes to their land.

Battle of Wounded Knee, SD

A battle between the U.S. Army and the Dakota Sioux, in which several hundred Native Americans and 29 U.S. soldiers died. Tensions erupted violently over two major issues: the Sioux practice of the "Ghost Dance," which the U.S. government had outlawed, and the dispute over whether Sioux reservation land would be broken up because of the Dawes Act.

Dawes Severalty Act (1887)

An act that broke up Indian reservations and distributed land to individual households. Leftover land was sold for money to fund U.S. government efforts to "civilize" Native Americans. Of 130 million acres held in Native American reservations before the Act, 90 million were sold to non-Native buyers.

Bureau of Indian Affairs

created (1824) in the U.S. War Dept. and transferred (1849) to the U.S. Dept. of the Interior. The War Dept. managed Native American affairs after 1789, but a separate bureau was not set up for many years. It had jurisdiction over trade with Native Americans, their removal to the West, their protection from exploitation, and their concentration on reservations. Because of wide dissatisfaction in the West over army administration of Native American affairs, the responsibility was given to the Dept. of the Interior and reorganized. The new bureau was no more successful than its predecessor in preventing wars with Native Americans or in protecting their rights.

Helen Hunt Jackson

A writer. Author of the 1881 book A Century of Dishonor. The book exposed the U.S. governments many broken promises to the Native Americans. For example the government wanted Native Americans to assimilate, i.e. give up their beliefs and ways of life, that way to become part of the white culture.

A Century of Dishonor

Written by Helen Maria Hunt Jackson and published in 1881, Century of Dishonor called attention to what Jackson termed the government's "shameful record of broken treaties and unfulfilled promises" and helped spark calls for the reform of federal Indian policy.

Joseph F. Glidden

1874 invented a superior type of barbed wire and in 1883 the company was producing 600 miles of the product each day; the barbed wire was used against trespassing cattle

sod house

home made of chunks of grassy soil built by the pioneers of the Great Plains.

genizaros

Detribalized Indians working as servants for the Spanish and Mexicans

Californios

Settlers of Spanish or Mexican descent who populated California

Tong Wars

began as social groups for Chinese citizens but turned to criminal activity

Workingman's Party of CA

was afraid that chinese would take away their jobs because they would work for lower wages

Chinese Exclusion Act (1882)

Bill passed by Congress in response to labor disputes that prohibited all immigration from China until 1943.

Timber Culture Act (1873)

Act which allotted 160 acres to individuals in certain Western states if they agreed to plant one fourth of it with trees.

Desert Land Act (1877)

Legislation allowing fed gov't to sell cheap arid land under the condition that purchaser would irrigate it within 3 yrs

Frederick Jackson Turner

United States historian who stressed the role of the western frontier in American history (1861-1951)

"Turner Frontier Thesis"

Theory put forth by Frederick Turner that stated the frontier was the source of American vitality and exceptionalism.

Comstock Lode

first major U.S. discovery of silver ore, located under what is now Virginia City, Nevada, on the eastern slope of Mount Davidson, a peak in the Virginia Range. After the discovery was made public in 1859, prospectors rushed to the area and scrambled to stake their claims. Mining camps soon thrived in the vicinity, which became bustling centers of fabulous wealth.

cow town

towns where cattle were held in pens until they could be loaded into railroad cars and shipped into markets in the East

Chisholm Trail

the major long drive route north from Texas to Ablilene, Kansas, where cowboys drove herds of cattle to the railroads to be shipped back East for huge profits

Exodusters

the African Americans migrating to the Great Plains state (ie: Kansas & Oklahoma) in 1879 to escape conditions in the South

"Open" range

A vast area of grassland owned by the government where ranchers could graze their herds for free

"Range" Wars

a type of (typically undeclared) conflict that occurs in agrarian or stockrearing societies. Typically fought over water rights or grazing rights to unfenced/unowned land, it could pit competing farmers or ranchers against each other

"Buffalo Bill" Cody

This former pony express rider and Indian fighter and hero of popular dime novels for children traveled around the U.S. and Europe and put on popular Wild West shows. The shows included re-enactments of Indian battles and displays of horsemanship and riflery

Annie Oakley

United States sharpshooter who was featured in Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show

"Calamity" Jane

United States frontierswoman and legendary figure of the Wild West noted for her marksmanship

Tombstone, AZ

city in Cochise County, Arizona, United States, founded in 1879 by Ed Schieffelin in what was then Pima County, Arizona Territory. It was one of the last wide-open frontier boomtowns in the American Old West.

Owen Wister

famous writer of fiction set on the western frontier. Wister's most famous work remains the 1902 novel The Virginian, which discussed a story of a cowboy/all american hero who took the side of the large land owners.

Frederick Remington

an American painter, illustrator, sculptor, and writer who specialized in depictions of the American West