Chapter 17: The West Exploiting an Empire 1849-1902

These vocabulary flashcards cover the key figures, events, policies, and geographic terms associated with the exploitation and settlement of the American West between 1849 and 1902.

Lean Bear

A Cheyenne chief who met with President Abraham Lincoln in 1863 to assure him that Native people wanted peace, only to be later killed by federal troops in 1864 while wearing his peace medal.

Great Plains

A treeless, nearly flat region extending from the Mississippi River to the Rocky Mountains, characterized by an endless sea of grassy hillocks and a lack of lumber and surface water.

Chivington Massacre

Also known as the Sand Creek Massacre, it occurred on November 29, 1864, when Colorado militia led by Colonel John M. Chivington attacked a sleeping camp of Cheyenne and Arapaho under Chief Black Kettle.

Fetterman Massacre

An 1866 event where Sioux Chief Red Cloud lured an army column under Captain William J. Fetterman into an ambush and killed all 82 soldiers in the heart of the Sioux hunting grounds.

Battle of the Little Bighorn

An 1876 conflict where Lieutenant Colonel George Armstrong Custer and his force of 265 men were killed by a larger Native American army of 2,500 warriors led by Crazy Horse and Sitting Bull.

Ghost Dances

A late nineteenth-century religious movement under the prophet Wovoka that involved rites intended to restore Native American lands and cause white men to disappear.

Wounded Knee Massacre

A December 1890 event in South Dakota where troopers of the Seventh Cavalry killed approximately 200 Native Americans, including many women and children, while attempting to stop the Ghost Dance religion.

Carlisle Indian School

An institution founded in 1879 by Richard H. Pratt in Pennsylvania that aimed to assimilate Native American youths by stripping them of their tribal identities and teaching them white culture.

Dawes Severalty Act

An 1887 law intended to break up traditional tribal life by dividing tribal lands into small plots of $160$ acres for family heads, $80$ acres for single adults, and $40$ acres for children.

Gold Rush of 1849

The first significant gold strike along the Sierra Nevada Mountains in California, which established the pattern for subsequent mining booms in the West.

Overland Trail

A network of trails leading from the Missouri River to the Pacific coast that served as the primary route for migration between 1849 and the late nineteenth century.

Homestead Act of 1862

Legislation that offered $160$ acres of land to anyone who paid a $10$ registration fee and pledged to live on and cultivate the land for five years.

National Reclamation Act (Newlands Act)

A 1902 law that set aside proceeds from the sale of public lands in 16 western states to finance irrigation projects for arid regions.

Californios

Descendants of original Spanish colonizers in southern California who largely lost their vast landholdings to drought and mortgages after the 1860s.

Placer mining

A mining method used by individual prospectors involving a shovel and a washing pan to separate gold from ore in streams and riverbeds.

Comstock Lode

Discovered in 1859 near Virginia City, Nevada, this was the richest ore deposit in mining history, producing silver and gold worth more than $306$ million dollars.

Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882

The first exclusionary law in the United States aimed at a specific racial group; it suspended the immigration of Chinese laborers for 10 years.

Joseph G. McCoy

An Illinois livestock shipper who established the cattle shipping center in Abilene, Kansas, creating a system to get Texas beef to eastern markets via rail.

Chisholm Trail

The most famous cattle trail, running from southern Texas through Oklahoma Territory to the railheads at Ellsworth and Abilene, Kansas.

Exodusters

A group of about 6,000 African Americans who fled the South in 1879 to establish freer lives as farmers or laborers in Kansas.

National Grange of the Patrons of Husbandry

Founded in 1867 by Oliver H. Kelley, this organization provided social, cultural, and educational activities to relieve the drabness and isolation of farm life.

Turner's thesis

Put forth by Frederick Jackson Turner in 1893, it asserted that the frontier and its settlement had shaped the American character and fostered individualism and independence.

Boomers and Sooners

Terms for participants in the 1889 Oklahoma District opening; Boomers waited for the signal, while Sooners jumped the gun to claim land early.