Ch.17

1. Manifest Destiny

 This was the belief that the US was destined to spread to the Pacific, perhaps over the

entire continent.

 Motivations for Manifest Destiny included the following: 1) hunger for land, 2) fear that

the British would gain control of the western part of North America, 3) the need for

Pacific ports to facilitate trade with Asia, 4) the belief that expansion would allow the

spread of democracy, 5) the desire to expand American power, and 6) the desire for new

markets for American products.

2. Federal Government Assistance

 Despite the dominant economic philosophy of laissez-faire (which urged no government

intervention in the economy), the federal government intervened in a number of ways to

encourage economic development during this period. In addition to the generous

subsidies given to the railroads, the government aided industry through protective tariffs,

agriculture benefited from the Homestead Act and the Hatch Act of 1887 (established

agricultural experiment stations), and the National Banking Act provided a relatively

stable currency.

3. Homestead Act—1862

 With the South out of Congress for the duration of the Civil War, Republicans dominated

Washington. Without Democratic opposition, they enacted a number of their campaign

promises: a transcontinental railroad, the Morrill Land Grant Act (which funded state

land-grant universities), and the Homestead Act.

 The Homestead Act gave 160 acres of public land to settlers who lived on the land for

five years, build a 12 x 14 dwelling, and raise crops.

 Although 160 acres was usually large enough for a farm in the wetter eastern states, on

the dry prairie more land was needed for a successful farm. Many homesteaders failed.

 By 1900 600,000 claims had been filed, and 80 million acres passed into the hands of

individuals.

4. Pacific Railway Acts (1862, 1864)

 The first Pacific Railway Act authorized and granted land rights to the Union Pacific

Railroad Company to construct a railroad westward from Omaha, Nebraska. Each mile of

rail laid equaled a government loan bond, plus

 The second Pacific Railway Act doubled the size of land grants and allowed the railroads

to sell their own bonds. This eventually spurred the completion of the Transcontinental

Railroad in 1869. Congress soon discovered the acts were abused by railroad

entrepreneurs to earn more land and bonds. Not all railroads were built straight…

5. Railroad Construction Post-Civil War

 With the South out of the Congress during the Civil War, Republicans commissioned a

northern rail route to the Pacific from Omaha to Sacramento.

 The Union Pacific (eastern construction) and Central Pacific (western construction)

received generous loans and grants of land for each mile of track laid. Costs were

increased by fraud in the Crédit Mobilier scandal.

 Construction provided jobs for Union veterans and Irish immigrants in the East and

Chinese immigrants in the West.

 The two lines were joined at Promontory Point, Utah, in 1869. This transcontinental rail

line linked the West Coast more tightly to the Union, made trade with Asia easier and

more profitable and facilitated western settlement.

 Four additional transcontinental rail lines were completed by the end of the century.

6. Exodusters

 Exodusters were African Americans who took part in the Exodus of 1879, the first mass

migration of African Americans from the South after the Civil War. The majority of the

exodusters settled in Kansas where it was viewed as a “promised land” since it fought

hard to be a free state.

7. Buffalo Soldiers

 The name was supposedly given to African Americans by Native Americans who fought

against Buffalo Soldiers in the west during the Indian Wars.

 Buffalo soldiers joined the U.S. Cavalry and Infantry to obtain equal rights but ironically

fought to suppress Native Americans who were fighting to protect their land, livelihood,

and culture.

 Buffalo soldiers would not only fight in various conflicts such as the Red River War or at

the Battle of San Juan Hill in the Spanish American War, but they would also be amongst

the first national park rangers. The 92nd Infantry Division would embrace the Buffalo

symbol during WWI and WWII.

8. Newlands Reclamation Land – 1902

 To encourage the development of the West, the government sold public lands and used

that money to fund irrigation projects in arid regions. Farmers who benefitted from these

irrigation projects paid fees for water use. Those funds were then used to fund further

irrigation projects (i.e. DAMS).

9. John Deere’s Steel Plow—1837

 More efficient at breaking up the tough sod of the Great Plains, Deere’s plow was one

factor in transforming the area from open cattle ranges to farms.

10. Bonanza farms

 These were massive farms in the Midwest who would hire managers and cheap labor to

grow crops, mainly wheat. OpenStax suggests these were very profitable and successful

through the end of the nineteenth century; however, in the 1890s most bonanza farms

began to sell their land due to land exhaustion. By the 1920s, bonanza farms were non-

existent. The reasons for the downfall of bonanza farms will also foreshadow big

problems for Midwest farmers in the late-1920s and early-1930s.

11. California and the 49ers

 Gold was discovered in California in 1848. In 1849 there was a huge rush of 100,000

gold seekers to the territory.

 Californians, encouraged by President Taylor, bypassed the territory stage, drafted a

constitution that barred slavery, and applied for statehood. Predictably, the North and

South disagreed about the status of slavery in California.

12. Comstock Lode

 In 1859, a massive deposit of silver was found in the Nevada territory. Like the

California Gold Rush, boomtowns sprung up and the population exploded. Over $300

million worth of silver ore was extracted from the lode, resulting in the establishment of a

U.S. branch mint in Carson City and the establishment of Nevada as a state.

 The Comstock Lode, along with other discovered silver deposits, contributed to the desire

for currency to be backed by silver.

13. The Long Drive (Cattle trails)

 Cowboys would drive cattle to railroad terminals (Dodge City, Abilene, Cheyenne)

where they were loaded on trains for the slaughterhouses of Chicago and Kansas City.

There they were butchered and shipped east in refrigerated rail cars; this practice faded

out as more settlers came and fenced the Great Plains.

14. Cultural Diversity in the Saddle

 Vaqueros—Mexican cowboys or vaqueros (a term eventually Anglicized to buckaroo)

made up about a third of all cowboys on the Great Plains in the 1880s. Mexicans had

been herding cattle in the American Southwest since the time of Juan de Oñate in 1598.

Among other things, they added to the vocabulary of ranching with words such as lariat,

rodeo, chaps, and pinto.

 Black Cowboys—Both before and after emancipation, many blacks worked as cowboys.

After the Civil War, perhaps one in four cowboys was black. The most famous, because

he wrote his memoirs, was Nat Love, a former slave.

15. Joseph Glidden’s Barbed Wire—1874

 Glidden developed a superior form of barbed wire that facilitated the building of fences

on treeless prairies and kept cattle out of crops. It too helped to end the Long Drive and

other cattle drives.

 Barbed wire changed the west, along with its mythos. It effectively destroyed all cattle

trails and cowboy culture.

16. The Winter of 1886-1887 (NOT IN OPENSTAX)

 This was one factor that helped end the classic cowboy era of the West. This terrible

blizzard killed thousands of cattle with temperatures of –68° F.

17. Significance of Prostitution

 Prostitution is another aspect of human history, let alone US History, whose significance

is often undervalued or neglected. For some women, prostitution was the only available

source of income, especially in the west. To others, prostitution was a better occupation

compared to being a pioneer wife; even when you knew the risks.

 As our text suggests, prostitution also allowed many prostitutes to thrive as

businesswomen.

 For example, when Seattle became a more prominent city in the Gilded Age,

“seamstresses” was a very popular job title for a lot of women in the city. This, however,

was not necessarily a bad thing because prostitution was a major business in Seattle. In

fact, the most prominent brothel in Seattle saved the city’s financial life. Madam Lou

Graham, arguably one of the richest people in Seattle during the Gilded Age, took out

various loans to save Seattle’s main banking institution. Lou Graham was also big on

education and paid for her employees to obtain an education. To some degree,

prostitution may have been the only way for some women in Seattle to get such an

education.

 When Lou Graham died, the majority of her estate when to Seattle’s public schools.

18. Comstock Law—1873

 Anthony Comstock founded the New York Society for the Suppression of Vice and

demanded that city officials close gambling houses and lottery operations. He went on to

a career targeting everything from the writings of George Bernard Shaw to art schools

that displayed nude sculpture.

 The federal Comstock Law banned, among other things, promoting or writing about

contraceptive devices. The law made it illegal to send any “obscene, lewd, or lascivious”

books through the mail.

 The Comstock Law manifested the conflict over the place of women in society and the

tension between traditional and modern culture.

19. First Treaty of Fort Laramie - 1851

 This treaty reserved a massive tract of land in the northwest region of the Midwest

between Montana, Wyoming, the Dakotas, and Nebraska for eight Plains Indian tribes.

The treaty specifically stated, “The aforesaid Indian nations do hereby recognize and

acknowledge the following tracts of country, included within the metes and boundaries

hereinafter designated, as their respective territories.”

 Here is a map showing the treaties proposed land allotment.

20. The Dakota War

 The Dakota, considered to be eastern Sioux, were guaranteed various rights, including

reservation land, in Minnesota, through various treaties in the decades leading up to the

conflict. The U.S.; however, deleted various articles from these treaties (or simply

ignored them) which resulted in further white encroachment upon supposed reservation

land. This resulted in a band of Dakota to rise up and attempt to push back white

encroachers.

 After the conflict, the leaders of the voluntary regiments requested the execution of 303

men. Lincoln, despite being in the depths of the Civil War, read through each Dakota’s

sentencing (within a month!) and determined only 39 would be executed. Regardless of

this extraordinary legal feat, 38 Dakota Indians were hung, the single largest mass

execution in U.S. history…

 We have already discussed the practice of the federal government to “ignore” signed

treaties; even Washington ignored signed treaties after the Revolutionary War. The

significant concept to grasp with the Dakota War, as well as the other various conflicts is

the continuation of the U.S. government to ignore or simply forget treaties signed with

Native American groups. Read this link to further understand the legality of treaties.

21. Sand Creek Massacre (Sand Creek, Colorado) – 1864

 Colorado miners forced the Indians into a small area called the Sand Creek Reserve

where they were running out of food. Because of this, some began raiding trails and

settlements, and the governor called out the militia. He told the Indians who did not want

to fight to go to Fort Lyon where they would be safe. On November 29, 1864, Colonel

J.M. Chivington attacked 500 Cheyenne at the Sand Creek Reserve, despite the fact that

the Indians were showing both a white flag and a US flag. Four hundred and fifty Indians

were killed.

22. Second Treaty of Fort Laramie - 1868

 The 1851 treaty did NOT bar the travel of white people through the designated Indian

land; part of the treaty allowed for wagon trails and railroads to be built through the land

guaranteed to Native Americans. However, over time this continuous contact resulted in

increased tensions and conflicts began to break out. This is what led to the 1868 treaty.

 This treaty created the Great Sioux Reservation. As a reservation, the government

promised in the treaty to close down the forts bordering the reservation, along with the

trails that went through the land. This included the Bozeman trail. Land outside of the

reservation would be considered unceded Indian territory.

 This is significant for two reasons: 1) It would now be easier for federal agents to

negotiate and white settlers to encroach on unceded Indian land. The idea the Sioux have

a federally protected reservation gives weight for negation and encroachment; 2) The

sacred Black Hills are in the Great Sioux Reservation…

 A map of the Great Sioux Reservation and the 1868 treaty can be found here.

23. Treaty of Medicine Lodge Creek

 The Indian Peace Commission, set up in 1867, were charged with finding a “peaceful”

solution to the Indian problem in the Plains. Later that year, they signed three distinct

treaties with the Kiowa, Comanche, Apache, Southern Cheyenne, and Arapaho tribe. All

three treaties (later termed the Treaty of Medicine Lodge Creek) moved these tribes to the

Indian Territory (Oklahoma) and provided government assistance to the tribes.

 The treaties never reached the adult male percentage required from Native American

males to be legally ratified; Congress approved the treaty anyway. The Dawes Severalty

Act essentially ripped up this treaty and the reservation land for each tribe in the Indian

Territory was significantly reduced if any remained.

24. The Black Hills, South Dakota

 In 1874 Colonel George Custer led an expedition into the Black Hills and announced that

he had discovered gold; white miners poured into the area in violation of the treaty.

25. Battle of the Little Big Horn—1876

 In response to the invasion of the Black Hills, the Sioux turned to war. Custer was

assigned the job of defeating the Indians and forcing them back to the reservation.

 In June Custer led his men against a superior Indian force led by Sitting Bull and Crazy

Horse at the Little Big Horn River in Montana. Custer’s forces were wiped out, but this

was the last victory for the Native Americans, who were inexorably pushed back to the

reservations.

 Why is this battle so famous? Custer was a relentless self-promoter who kept his name

and exploits in the papers. Custer was also being seriously considered for the Democratic

presidential nomination. And news of Custer’s defeat reached the East just in time for the

July 4, 1876, centennial celebration, dampening the festivities.

26. Helen Hunt Jackson, A Century of Dishonor—1881 (NOT IN OPENSTAX)

 Jackson was a noted author whose study A Century of Dishonor documented the

mistreatment and broken promises of the treatment of Native Americans by the US

government.

27. Sitting Bull and Buffalo Bill

 Sitting Bull was technically captured in 1881 after the Canadian government refused to

support the Sioux Tribe. He was eventually returned to Standing Rock Agency.

 In 1885, the agency allowed Sitting Bull to tour with Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show.

The agency was always concerned Sitting Bull would stir up trouble at Standing Rock so

they were glad to get rid of him.

 Sitting Bull toured with Buffalo Bill for four months, earning over $50 a week for riding

around the arena on horse once per show. He got fed up with white society and returned

to Standing Rock.

 On December 15, 1890, while the Ghost Dance movement was spreading through various

reservations, the Standing Rock agents grew concerned Sitting Bull would try to start it at

their reservation. 43 Lakota policemen were sent to arrest and detain Sitting Bull. As they

dragged him out of his cabin, his followers engaged the Lakota. During the scuffle, one

of the Lakota shot Sitting Bull in the head.

28. Chief Joseph and the Nez Percé

 The Nez Percé from northeastern Oregon were also pressured to leave their tribal lands

and go to a reservation. Chief Joseph led warriors, old people, women, and children on a

1700-mile dash for Canada to escape the fate of confinement on a reservation. A few

miles short of their goal, they were finally defeated and sent to a reservation in Kansas.

 Said Chief Joseph, “Our chiefs are killed… the old men are all dead… the little children

are freezing to death…Hear me my chiefs. My heart is sick and sad. From where the sun

now stands, I will fight no more forever.”

29. Indian Complaint to the Sioux Commission, 1889 – Prelude to Wounded Knee

 “Tell your people that since the Great White Father promised that we should never be

removed we have been moved five times… I think you had better put the Indians on

wheels and you can run them about wherever you wish.”

30. The Ghost Dance and Wounded Knee, South Dakota—1890

 In 1889 Wovoka, a Paiute Indian, claimed he was the Messiah returned to make

everything better. If Indians showed their faith by dancing, the buffalo would return, the

whites would disappear, and the Indians and their ancestors would enjoy the world as it

once was. Sioux danced, ignored their farm work, and made the reservation agents

worried that there would be an uprising. The Seventh Cavalry was sent for.

 On December 29, 1890, at Wounded Knee, South Dakota, the cavalry searched 350 old

men, women, and children for weapons. After two rifles were found and a small scuffle

occurred, a gun fired. Soldiers on a hill heard the shot and began firing their Hotchkiss

machine guns. In the end, there were about two hundred Indians and thirty-five whites

dead. Bullets from their own side killed most of the whites.

 This was the last major fight of the Indian wars; 20 soldiers received the Medal of Honor.

31. Factors Leading to the Conquest of the Plains Indians

 Transcontinental railroads brought endless numbers of troops, cattlemen, and farmers.

 Native Americans showed little resistance to white diseases or to alcohol.

 The destruction of the great buffalo herds, dropping from perhaps 60 million animals to

about 1000, destroyed the Indians’ supply of food, fuel, and hides.

32. Americanization (American Branded Assimilation)

 The Americanization movement of the early twentieth century came about due to the

massive influx of European immigration at the turn of the century; however,

Americanization was already being practiced towards Native Americans up to 1900.

 After the Indian Wars, the federal government had outlawed almost all tribal customs and

practices. With this, most assumed Native Americans would take on American customs

and assimilate into the larger “white” society.

 To this day, Americanization efforts are still underway as Native Americans continue to

fight for their tribal rights and equitable status in the U.S.

33. Carlisle Indian Schools

 A stark example of Americanization, Carlisle Boarding Schools were a major attempt to

teach Native American children the ways of American “white” society.

 Richard Pratt, the founder of the Boarding Schools in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, had the

motto, “Kill the Indian, Save the Man.”

34. The Dawes Severalty Act—1887

 This act abolished Indian tribes and gave the heads of Indian families 160 acres of

reservation land to farm, with twenty-five years to learn how to handle their own affairs.

It also was to grant Indians US citizenship. Unfortunately, they were not given farm

equipment or taught how to farm, and the Office of Indian Affairs didn’t provide proper

health care for the reservation Indians.

 White speculators bought up about 2/3 of the reservation land. Land not distributed in

allotments was put up for sale. Indian minors who inherited land were put under the

control of white guardians who often looted the resources of their wards.

 The 1906 Burke Act postponed citizenship until the end of the twenty-five-year period;

Native Americans gained citizenship in 1924 with the Indian Citizenship Act.

35. Chinese Immigrants in the West

 Chinese immigrants came to the U.S. to seek fortunes to support their families back in

China. The California Gold Rush led to a boom

36. Chinese Exclusion Act—1882

 In California, Denis Kearney and others (recently arrived European immigrants

themselves) resented the even more recently arrived Chinese taking away jobs from white

workers. The Chinese faced discrimination, physical abuse, and even murder.

 Congress passed a bill restricting the immigration of Chinese laborers, but Hayes vetoed

it, arguing that it violated an existing treaty with China. After Hayes left the White

House, Congress passed the bill again.

37. Las Gorras Blancos

 “The White Caps” were a band of Mexican Americans who were trying to intimidate and

scare away white squatters in the New Mexico territory. They dressed up in white and

there are some family rumors that the group’s founders were inspired by the KKK, but

for the opposite motives. The Las Gorras Blancos motives were to protect and defend the

poor.

Not Mentioned in OpenStax but Important to Know About

38. Seward’s Folly—1867

 Secretary of State Seward bought Alaska from Russia for a bargain price. Seward was

mocked for buying a frozen wasteland. But expansionists were cheered by the purchase,

and the land eventually turned out to be rich in gas and oil.

39. Artist Frederic Remington

 He was the foremost artist of the vanishing way of life of the West.

40. Oklahoma Land Rush—1889

 Oklahoma, at one point set aside as Indian Territory, was opened for white settlement in

April of 1889.

 Many whites tried to sneak in and stake land claims early; they were therefore called

sooners.