unsettled land that mostly Idians lived in. Americans wanted to make war over this land because most believed in manifest destiny.
Frontier
Land that spreads from the Missouri river to the Rocky Mountains.
Great Plains
A town that all of the sudden, population and economy growth from gold and silver strikes.
Boomtowns
The cattle are driven to cow towns along the railways.
Long Drive
the first cowboys.
Vaqueros
A person who carried a gun around and shoots random people without a trial
vigilante
Land reserved for native americans by the federal government (no one else wanted the land)
Reservation
A surprise attack from Americans to Indians. They rode on their horses in a circle around them and shot them.
Sand Creek Massacre
A Native American leader that fled with his followers to Canada. Chief of the Sioux tribe. Helped defeat George A custer.
Sitting Bull
Officer in the union army and is famous for dying at the biggest loss in the US against the Indians.
George A. Custer
The death of Custer and his troops became a rallying point for the United States to increase their efforts to force native peoples onto reservation lands. Indians big victory.
Battle of the Little Bighorn
ended armed resistance in the West.
Wounded Knee Massacre
stop communal land sharing, forced families to separate, and forced assimilation of Indians (blending into a new culture), forced by sending them to boarding school and bringing them away from families.
Dawes Act
A piece of land with a house on it in a barely populated area. Built the house themselves.
Homestead
Mexican speaking southerners.
Mexicano
a buffalo hunter that turned into a showman and brought the West to the rest of the world through his Wild West show (most of the info were myths).
William ¨Buffalo Bill¨ Cody
Black American soldiers who controlled planes, etc. stationed in national parks, shot buffalo, became first park rangers.
Buffalo Soldiers
This law offered 160 acres of land free to anyone who agreed to live on and improve the land for five years. They did this because they wanted to increase white population to outnumber indians.
Homestead Act
African Americans (former slaves) migrated to the west to find land for themselves and compared themselves to hebrews.
Exoduster
The people who live in a house with sod as the top layer of prairie soil that is thickly matted with grass roots.
Sodbuster
The group’s main purpose at first had been to meet the social needs and cooperatives of farm families who lived great distances from one another.
Grange
a business that is not owned by an owner, owned by the workers.
Cooperatives
wanted the government to adopt a free silver policy and represented the interests of farmers (inflation).
Populist Party
the government backs every dollar with a certain amount of gold. Only a certain amount of money could be made.
Gold Standard
supported gold, most famous populist, supported farmers, tried to be president 3 times and lost all times.
William Jennings Bryan
List several states which were in the Great Plains:
Piece of land between the rocky mountains and Missouri river (South Dakota, North Dakota, part of Texas, Nebraska, Kansas, part of Oklahoma, part of new mexico).
Myths about the Wild West vs. the historic reality:
Life in the West was full of adventure and excitement (only ever saw immediate family).
There were many gun fights in the west (they were rare).
Most people in the west were rich (only a small amount)
Lives of the Sodbusters. Give a couple of examples of hardships they faced:
The lives of sodbusters were very harsh, full of work, and boring. They faced hardships like finding a reliable water source.
How were the lives of pioneer women different from those of women in eastern cities?
Women in the west weren’t given much recognition for helping farms, ranches, etc while women in eastern cities had more recognition and independence.
How a farming cooperative works:
a business owned by everyone who works there. The negotiated with others a lot
Economic opportunities which drew people to the West:
cattle ranching, working on railroads, working to provide services.
Economic opportunities which drew people to the West (continued):
The fur industry
Economic policies of the Populist Party, give 2 examples:
free silver, inflation, and regulating railroads
Effects of white settlement on the lives of Plains Indians:
White settlers forced them on reservations, removed their power, wiping out buffalo, reservations, stopping their traditional way of life.
How the US Government encouraged western settlement:
Land grants and loans