Transcript Document

Out of Many
A History of the American People
Seventh Edition Brief Sixth Edition
Chapter
18
Conquest and Survival
The Trans-Mississippi
West
1860-1900
Out of Many: A History of the American People, Brief Sixth Edition
John Mack Faragher • Mari Jo Buhle • Daniel Czitrom • Susan H. Armitage
Copyright ©2012 by Pearson Education, Inc.
All rights reserved.
Conquest and Survival
The Trans-Mississippi West 1860-1900
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Indian Peoples Under Siege
The Internal Empire
The Open Range
Farming Communities on the Plains
The World’s Breadbasket
The Western Landscape
The Transformation of Indian Societies
Conclusion
Chapter Focus Questions
• What was the impact of U.S. western
expansion on Indian societies?
• In what ways was the post-Civil War West
an “internal empire,” and how did its
development depend on the emergence of
new technologies and new industries?
Chapter Focus Questions (cont’d)
• How can the history of the American West
be told as the creation of new communities
and the displacement of old communities?
• How did agribusiness differ from forms of
family farming?
• What place did the West hold in the
national imagination?
North America and Oklahoma
MAP 18.1 Oklahoma Territory
The Oklahoma Land Rush
• Thousands participated.
• Land promised to Indians who had been
forcibly relocated in the 1830s was first
opened to white settlement in 1889.
• In a little over two months settlers filed
6,000 homestead claims.
• The land rush symbolized the movement
toward white settlement and the
reconstruction of the West.
The Oklahoma Land Rush (cont'd)
• This transformation came at the expense
of Indian peoples.
Indian Peoples Under Siege
the Battle of Sand Creek
Indian Territory
• Indians occupied the plains for more than
20,000 years.
• The Europeans brought disease and the
need for Indians to adapt to European
ways.
Indian Territory (cont'd)
• Surviving tribes adapted:
 The Plains Indians adapted, using horses and
firearms.
 Some tribes learned English and converted to
Christianity.
Indian Territory (cont'd)
• Legally, tribes were supposed to be
regarded as autonomous nations residing
within American boundaries.
 Treaties were negotiated but force was often
used instead.
MAP 18.2 Major Indian Battles and Indian
Reservations, 1860–1900
Reservation Policy and
the Slaughter of the Buffalo
• The federal government had pressured
Indian tribes to migrate West into a
permanent Indian Territory.
 Whites’ desire for western land led the
federal government to pressure western
Indians to move to reservations.
Reservation Policy and
the Slaughter of the Buffalo (cont’d)
• The tribes that moved to reservations
found federal policies were inadequate for
their needs.
• Nomadic tribes found their freedom
curtailed and their buffalo destroyed both
by the railroad and white hunting.
• Diseases such as smallpox ravaged
weakened Indian populations.
Kiowa Preparing for a War Expedition, ca. 1887.
The Indian Wars
• 1860s War: against Cheyenne (Colorado)
 Sand Creek Massacre.
• 1868: Fort Laramie Treaty
 granted the Black Hills to the Sioux
- The discovery of gold brought prospectors to the
hills.
- The Sioux, Cheyenne, and Arapaho aligned to
protect the Black Hills, wiping out Custer’s
regiment before being defeated by the army.
• Red River War of 1874–1875
The Indian Wars (cont'd)
• Under the leadership of Geronimo, the
Apaches gained a reputation as intrepid
warriors.
The Nez Perces
• Tribes like the Nez Perce, who tried to
cooperate with whites, were betrayed.
• Promised Oregon, the Nez Perce were
sent to a disease-ridden land in Kansas.
• After violence broke out over Indian
mistreatment, Chief Joseph led his people
on a long march toward Canada.
The Nez Perces (cont'd)
• Defeated in northern Montana, the Nez
Perces surrendered and were forced onto
a reservation in Washington.
The Internal Empire
Map 18.3 Railroad Routes, Cattle Trails, Gold
and Silver Rushes, 1860–1900
The Internal Empire
• The settlement of the West was one of the
largest human migrations in history
• Settlers found themselves subjects of an
“internal empire” controlled from the East.
• Older populations were pushed aside by
white expansion.
“Stampeders,”
Mining Towns
• Mining fostered western expansion.
• Gold discoveries brought thousands of
fortune seekers.
• Most fortunes went to corporations that
bought out the smaller claims.
• Although some mine communities
eventually became permanent
settlements, most were short-lived
boomtowns.
Mining Towns (cont’d)
• The western labor movement emerged in
this rough and often violent climate.
• Unions refused membership to Chinese,
Mexican, African American and Indian
workers.
• Unions were unable to stop owners from
closing down mines when the ore ran out,
leaving empty towns and environmental
blight.
MAP 18.4 Mormon
Cultural Diffusion, ca.
1883
Mormon Settlements
• Mormons migrated to the Great Basin in
Utah beginning in 1846.
• They shared land and water as they built
agricultural communities.
• The federal government assumed control
of the Utah territory.
• Disputes over polygamy delayed Utah
statehood until 1896.
Mormon Settlements (cont'd)
• Mormon society soon resembled the
individualist East the original settlers had
sought to escape.
Mexican Borderland Communities
• The Southwest saw a series of clashes
between Anglos and Mexicanos over
control of the land.
• Some Mexicano elites continued to
maintain wealth and power.
• The majority of Mexicans found
themselves trapped in poverty and turned
to migratory work or moved to urban areas
to work for wages.
Mexican Borderland Communities
(cont’d)
• Mexicanos maintained key elements of
their traditional culture.
• In the 1890s, Las Gorras Blancas arose as
agrarian rebels in the Southwest.
• New immigration from Mexico reinforced
traditional culture.
Mexican Americans in San Antonio continued to
conduct their traditional market bazaar well after
the incorporation of this region into the United
States.
The Open Range
The Legendary Cowboy:
Nat Love, Deadwood Dick
The Open Range
• The destruction of buffalo opened the path
for the western cattle industry.
• After the Civil War, entrepreneurs like
Joseph McCoy began driving longhorn
cattle from Texas to the Kansas railroad
towns for shipment East
The Long Drives
• Cowboys rounded up herds for $30 a
month (at best) and lived under harsh
circumstances, stimulating efforts to
unionize.
 Workday lasted from sunup to sundown with
night shifts to watch the cattle.
 There was no protection from the elements.
 Poor diet often led to disease.
 The drive could be as far as 1,500 miles.
The Long Drives (cont’d)
• One-fifth to one-third of cowboys were
Indian, Mexican, or African American.
• Few women worked on the open range.
• Elizabeth Collins, the “Cattle Queen of
Montana” who took over her husband’s
ranch, was a rare exception.
The Sporting Life
• Cattle towns and mining camps offered
saloons, bars and dance halls where
cowboys could spend their pay and blow
off steam.
• Prostitution served as the largest source of
income outside the home for women.
 There were few jobs for women and many
resorted to prostitution simply to pay the bills.
The Sporting Life (cont'd)
• Their life was quite harsh and seldom paid
well.
As early as 1879, the local newspaper described
Leadville, Colorado, as a town that never sleeps
Frontier Violence and Racism
• Personal violence commonplace
• Horse theft and cattle rustling rose rapidly
• 1870s: Range wars turned violent when
farmers, sheep ranchers, and cattle
ranchers battled over the same land.
• Mid-1880s: cattle business went bust
 Overstocking
 Bad weather
Farming Communities on the Plains
“Soddies”
Farming Communities on the Plains
• Easterners struggled to adapt to the
Plains, with few trees and limited water.
• Improvements in technology and
transportation were vital to the growth of
the West.
“Thirty-three horse team harvester”
The Homestead Act
• 160 acres were given to any settler who
lived on the land for at least 5 years and
improved it.
 Homesteaders had their greatest success in
the central and upper Midwest where the soil
was rich and the weather was relatively
moderate.
The Homestead Act (cont.)
• This act sparked the largest migration in
U.S. history but only 10 percent of all
farmers got their start under its terms
(most farmers bought their land outright)
and nearly half the homesteaders lost their
claim.
• Railroad and land speculators profited
from selling off cheaply bought or free
land.
Populating the Plains
• Railroads held great power in developing
and settling the West.
 Railroads delivered crops and cattle to
eastern markets and brought back goods.
• Railroads put communities “on the map.”
 Railroads in the West preceded settlement.
 Professional promoters were sent to Europe
and throughout the United States to recruit
settlers.
Populating the Plains (cont’d)
• Immigrants formed tight-knit communities.
 Many groups retained their native languages
and customs.
 Tight social hierarchies, religion and ethnic
habits persisted for generations in these
communities.
Work, Dawn to Dusk
• Farm families survived and prospered
through hard work.
 Men’s work tended to be seasonal.
 Women’s activities were usually more
routine.
 Children worked running errands and
completing chores by about age nine.
Work, Dawn to Dusk (cont'd)
• Community was an important part of life.
 People depended on neighbors for help in
times of need and for a break from the hard
work and harsh climate.
Work, Dawn to Dusk (cont'd)
• The barter system developed due to lack
of cash.
• Many small farms failed, lost to low
incomes, debt and foreclosure.
The World’s Breadbasket
New Production Technologies
• Cultivation a difficult process because of
tough sod
• New technologies
 plows, reapers, threshers
- increased amount of farm land
• Through federal aid, land-grant colleges,
and other sources of scientific research,
farmers developed new techniques for
cultivation.
New Production Technologies
(cont'd)
• Weather and plagues of locusts continued
to challenge Plains farming.
TABLE 18.1 Machine Labor on the Farm, ca.
1880
California Agribusiness
• Larger farms which produced for global
markets came to dominate the West.
• California led the way toward large-scale
commercial farming that defined
agribusiness.
• By the turn of the century California had
become the showcase for heavily
capitalized farm factories employing large
numbers of tenant and migrant workers.
California Agribusiness (cont’d)
• Fruit and vegetable growers manipulated
consumer tastes to create new markets for
their products.
• Chinese tenants and farm workers were
exploited by white owners.
MAP 18.5 The Establishment of National Parks
and Forests
The Toll on the Environment
• Farmers destroyed existing plant and
animal species and introduced new ones.
• Replacing buffalo with cattle and sheep
introduced animals that ate grasses down
to the roots and created the possibilities of
huge dust storms.
• Commercial agriculture took a heavy toll
on existing water supplies.
The Toll on the Environment
(cont’d)
• The federal government created the
Forest Service to safeguard watersheds.
• The Newlands Act and other laws sought
to balance agribusiness and the protection
of the environment.
The Western Landscape
Albert Bierstadt became one of the first artists to
capture on enormous canvases the legendary
vastness and rugged terrain of western mountains
and wilderness
Nature’s Majesty
• Writers described in great detail the
wonder of nature’s majesty in the West.
• The federal government created national
parks in 1872, naming Yellowstone the
first.
• Landscape painters from the Rocky
Mountain School and Albert Bierstadt’s
photographs piqued the public’s interest
in the West.
Nature’s Majesty (cont'd)
• By 1910, more than a dozen national
parks had been created in the West.
The Legendary Wild West
• More popular presentations emphasized
the West as a source of “vigorous
manhood.”
• Thousands of “dime novels” appeared
that portrayed the region in romantic,
heroic terms.
• Wild West show promoters like “Buffalo
Bill” Cody brought the legendary West to
millions of people around the world.
The Legendary Wild West (cont'd)
• Frederick Jackson Turner’s 1893 “frontier
thesis” reinforced mythic views of the
West.
Annie Oakley
The “American Primitive”
• The West continued to captivate American
imagination.
• The public sought depictions of bold
cowboys and exotic savages.
• Charles Schreyvogel, Charles Russell,
and Frederic Remington helped to shape
Americans’ perception of the region.
The “American Primitive” (cont’d)
• Scholars like Lewis Henry Morgan and
Alice Cunningham Fletcher studied
Indians and began to develop a scientific
understanding of their lives.
• The Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts
incorporated a large dose of tribal lore into
their character-building programs.
•
The Transformation of
Indian Societies
Powell appears alongside Tau-gue,
Chief of the Paiutes, overlooking the
Virgin River.
Reform Policy and Politics
• Reformers like Helen Hunt Jackson
advocated policies designed to promote
Indian assimilation and eradicate distinct
tribal customs.
• Racist assumptions and indifferent
government treatment drove Plains culture
to the brink of destruction.
Reform Policy and Politics
• The Dawes Severalty Act of 1887 was a
disaster for most Indians and undermined
tribal sovereignty.
 Individuals were granted land if they chose to
sever from their tribes.
 Indian religions and sacred ceremonies were
banned along with the telling of Indian myths.
 “Indian schools” forbade Indian clothing
styles, language, and even hair fashions.
The Ghost Dance
• A Paiute prophet, Wovoka, had a vision
that a divine judgment was coming and led
the Sioux to practice the Ghost Dance.
 White authorities grew fearful and demanded
an end to the practice.
• An incident led whites to gun down 200
people at Wounded Knee.
The Ghost Dance (cont'd)
• 400 years after Columbus, the Massacre
seemed to signal the final conquest of
native peoples.
Endurance and Rejuvenation
• Those tribes that survived best were those
living on land unwanted by whites.
• A majority of tribes dwindled to the brink of
extinction; some even disappeared.
• The Navajo, Hopi, and northwestern tribes
managed to adapt to the new situation or
were sufficiently isolated to survive.
Endurance and Rejuvenation
(cont'd)
• It was several generations before a
resurgence of Indian sovereignty occurred.
Conclusion
Conquest and Survival: The TransMississippi West: 1860–1900
• Oklahoma’s rapid development stands as
a microcosm of the 19th-century West. As
railroads, mining, cattle and farming
“tamed” the region and its challenging
environment, white settlers adapted their
culture to the frontier.
Conquest and Survival: The TransMississippi West: 1860–1900 (cont'd)
• Marginalized in national economics and
politics, Westerners, along with
Southerners, would turn restive by
century’s end and demand their fair share
of national wealth, challenging the political
system.
Chronology