Post on 06-Mar-2018
■Essential Question:
–What economic, political, &
migratory factors led to the end
of the western frontier by 1890?
■Warm-Up Question:
–For each era, define what the
“West” was & what role the
West played in American life:
(a) 1750, (b) 1800, (c)1850
America After the Civil War: 1870-1900
Industrialization & Urbanization
Reconstruction & Rise of Jim Crow Segregation
Ranching, Mining, & Farming
America in the Gilded Age: 1870-1900
The South: By 1877, the South was recovering
from the Civil War but was no longer forced to “reconstruct”
The “New South”?
Sharecropping
“Jim Crow” reigned supreme as whites legally segregated the South into 2 distinct societies
We won’t discuss much about the South in this unit because, when
Reconstruction ended in 1877, few significant economic or political
changes took place until the 1940s
America in the Gilded Age: 1870-1900
The North: Experienced a “2nd Industrial Revolution,”
mass immigration, & urbanization
Railroads, steel, & oil companies formed America’s first monopolies
American industry & urbanization grew
America in the Gilded Age: 1870-1900
The West: Manifest Destiny
continued after 1865 as miners homesteaders,
& ranchers headed West
The United States by 1890
Established new
states & closed the frontier by 1890
Colorado
Washington Montana North Dakota
South Dakota
Idaho
Wyoming
Western raw materials fueled eastern factories
..but this came at the expense of
Native Americans
Settlement of the West
The Mining Bonanza
■Mining was the 1st magnet to
attract settlers to the West
■CA (1849) started the gold rush,
but strikes in Pikes Peak, CO &
Carson River Valley, NV (1859)
set off wild migrations to the West:
–Comstock Lode = $306 million
–John Mackay’s Big Bonanza
made him richest man in world
John Mackay earned $25 a minute from his gold/silver lode in Sierra Mountains
Mining
Regions of
the West
Discoveries of gold & silver led to overnight mining towns
Created need for local gov’t, law enforcement, sanitation, businesses, prostitutes
Individual “placer miners” took little skill or money to start, but could not reach deep lodes
Corporations had the expensive machinery (“hydraulic mining techniques”) to extract
most of the gold in the West
Mining Bonanza ■¼ to ½ of the mining population
was foreign born:
–Latin American miners brought experience & new techniques
–Chinese brought a tireless ethic
■Led to hostility & riots:
–Foreign Miners’ Act in 1852 charged a monthly mining fee
–Chinese Exclusion Act in 1882 suspended Chinese immigration
Pacific Chivalry: “Encouragement to Chinese Immigration”
"Courts of Justice Closed to Chinese Extra Taxes to 'Yellowjack'"
The
Cattle
Bonanza
In the 1860s, cattle ranching boomed
Ranchers used the
“open range” to graze
longhorns
By 1867, ranchers started using trains to ship cattle to Chicago
A cattle bought for $4 in Texas sold for $40 in Kansas
The Cattle Bonanza
■½ of all cowboys were black &
¼ were Mexican
■By 1880, the
“open range”
was ending:
–Wheat growers,
homesteaders, & barbed wire
blocked the range
–Many switched to raising sheep
But “range wars” erupted over grazing rights between cowboys & “sheep-boys”
The Farming Bonanza ■The U.S. gov’t offered incentives
for farmers to settle the West:
–Homestead Act (1862)—gave 160 acres of land if families pledged to live there for 5 years
–Other gov’t acts helped develop western lands by planting trees & building irrigation systems
–Due to land grants, RRs were the largest western landowners
500 million acres doled to businesses but only 80 million to homesteaders
2/3 of all homesteaders failed to farm their land
The Farming Bonanza
■In 1870, homesteaders pushed West & adapted to the harsh farming conditions:
–Farmers used dry farming techniques & planted tougher varieties of wheat
–New machinery sped harvesting & planting; led to bonanza farms
–By 1890, the U.S. became a major crop exporter
A pioneer sod house
Homestead Sales, 1870-1940
In 1900, the West made up 30% of the U.S. population (was 1% in 1850)
Exodusters
■Exodusters
were black
farmers who
moved West
to escape
Southern crop
liens & Jim
Crow Laws
Rails Across the Continent ■In 1862, Congress authorized the
transcontinental railroad:
–Union Pacific worked westward from Nebraska (Irish laborers)
–Central Pacific worked eastward from CA (Chinese immigrants)
–May 10, 1869 the 2 tracks met at Promontory Point in Utah
■By 1900, 4 more lines were built to the Pacific
1st transcontinental railroad connected the west coast to eastern cities in 1869
Chinese workers made up a large percentage of laborers
on the western leg
Irish workers made up a large percentage of laborers on the eastern section
Federal Land Grants to Railroads by 1871 The national gov’t doled $65 million &
millions of acres in land grants (received reduced rates for shipping)
The Transcontinental Railroad
In 1870, RR companies developed the 1st time zones to better schedule the RR system; the US
would not adopt time zones until 1918
“Pullman cars” & “refrigeration cars”
Railroad Construction, 1830-1920
■Essential Question:
–What economic, political, &
migratory factors led to the end
of the western frontier by 1890?
■Reading Quiz Ch 18A (p.606-625)
Crushing the
Native Americans
The Plains Indians
In 1865, 2/3 of all Indians lived on the Great Plains
Tribes of several 1,000 people were subdivided into bands of 100s which made it difficult for the U.S. to negotiate treaties
Their culture was dependent
upon the buffalo & the horse
Searching for an Indian Policy
■Before the Civil War, the West
was “one big reservation”
–The Indian Intercourse Act
(1834) forbade whites from
entering
“Indian
country”
without
a license
Searching for an Indian Policy
■But…rapid Western expansion in the 1850s brought a new Indian “concentration policy” with distinct boundaries for each tribe “as long as the waters run and grass grows”
Searching for an Indian Policy
■Concentration did not last as whites ignored these boundaries: –Sand Creek Massacre (1864)—
Col John Chivington attacked 700 sleeping Indians in CO after a peace agreement was signed
–Sioux War (1865-1867)—gold miners wanted a Bozeman Trail (across Sioux hunting grounds) to connect mining towns; Sioux murdered 88 U.S. soldiers
“Kill and scalp all, big and little”
Congress investigated & condemned Chivington’s attack
Searching for an Indian Policy ■In 1867, the U.S. formed the
Indian Peace Commission :
–Ended Bozeman Trail plans
–Made “small reservations” in the Dakota & Oklahoma territories
■Few Native Americans settled into these reservations peacefully:
–Red River War (1874)
–Little Big Horn (1876)
–Wounded Knee Massacre (1890)
Black soldiers in the U.S. army called “buffalo soldiers” were used to fend
off Indian attacks in the West
The discovery of gold in South Dakota led a Sioux army of 2,500 to ambush
& kill Lt Col Custer & his 197 soldiers
“Custer’s Last Stand” set off demands for revenge among Americans
The U.S. army was ordered to stop Sioux “ghost dances” & machine
gunned 200 men, women, & children
The End of Tribal Life
■In 1871, the U.S. adopted its 4th
Indian policy: Assimilation
–U.S. citizenship was offered to
all Indians who farmed, lived
away from their tribe & “adopted
the habits of civilized life”
–Dawes Severalty Act in 1887
offered farms (160 acres to
families & 80 to men) & the
protection of U.S. laws
“Kill the Indian and save the man” —Richard Pratt, founder of Carlisle
The End of Tribal Life
■The final blow to Indian culture came with annihilation of buffalo:
–Began with the construction of the transcontinental RR in 1860s
–From 1872 to 1874, 3 million buffalo were killed each year
1 hunter = 100 buffalo per day
The Final Fling
■In 1889, Congress responded to
demands to open the Oklahoma
Territory to white settlement
■On April 22, 1889, about 100,000
“Boomers” & “Sooners” flooded
into the last “Indian land”
–White migrants claimed 2 million
acres in Oklahoma homesteads
–Moved out Creeks & Seminoles
Oklahoma “Boomers” waiting for noon “Sooners” couldn’t wait until noon
Lands Lost by Native Americans (1894) Indian Reservations Today
Conclusions: The End of the Frontier
■By 1890, the western frontier ended
–Miners, ranchers, & cowboys
flooded West at the expense of
Indians who were restricted to
smaller & smaller reservations
–Westerners were commercially
connected to Eastern markets but
would grow increasingly frustrated
by the economic & political
concentration of power in the East
A continuation of antebellum
“Manifest Destiny”
With no more West to conquer, where would American expansion
go next?