The Nation Prior to the Civil War

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The Nation Prior to the Civil War
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A Growing Nation

• After the colonies were filled to capacity with
  immigrants seeking the New World and most of the
  land on the East was filled with farms and towns
  colonization of the land west of the Appalachian
  mountains began.
• Daniel Boone was a pioneer (one of the first of a
  certain group to enter or settle a region) of
  Kentucky. In 1775, he helped settlers travel
  across the Appalachian mountains by helping to
  build a road called the Wilderness Road through
  the Cumberland Gap.

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• After settlers crossed the Appalachian mountains,
  they used the Ohio River and the Ohio River
  Valley to build new settlements because of access
  to fertile land and the river for transporting
  people and goods.
• Settlers thought they were settling on frontier
  land (land at the edge of a country or settled
  area) but in actuality they were settling on land
  that the American Indians occupied.
• Notice they did not claim to own the land-
  American Indians believed that no one could own
  the land as it was not theirs to own.

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• Thomas Jefferson in 1803 bought a huge chunk of
  land west of the Mississippi from the French for
  people to settle on and with the hopes of finding
  a water route to the Pacific Ocean. This sale
  was called the Louisiana Purchase.
• The Louisiana Purchase doubled the size of the
  country.

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• As more and more people began moving west, unrest
  and fighting between the settlers and American
  Indians broke out. Settlers believed they were
  owed the land, while the American Indians felt
  they had to protect their land from these people.
• Andrew Jackson President of the United States in
  1828 signed the Indian Removal Act of 1830. This
  law ordered people of Indian nations east of the
  Mississippi River to move west to Oklahoma. He
  sent the US Army to enforce this law.

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• People of the Cherokee Nation argued at the
  Supreme Court that the Indian Removal Act of 1830
  was illegal. The Supreme Court agreed and ruled
  that it was against the law to force the
  Cherokees to move.
• President Jackson ignored this ruling and in 1838
  had the US Army force the Cherokee on a 1,000
  mile trip west.
• Thousands upon thousands of Cherokee died during
  this journey known as the Trail of Tears.

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Industrial Revolution

• From 1790-1850, Americans found ways to make
  items that were usual made by hand and one at a
  time- faster, easier, and cheaper through the
  help of machines and advancements in
  transportation.

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Machines

• Machines allowed for goods to be made with
  interchangeable parts. Interchangeable parts are
  parts made by a machine to be exactly the same so
  that any of them could fit into another product
  with the same design.
• This mass production, or making many products at
  one time, meant that things could be produced
  more quickly which in turn increased
  productivity.

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• Lets take for example the shirt you are wearing.
• Prior to 1790 to get the shirt you are wearing
• Someone (s) had to plant the cotton seeds 6
  months before they planned to harvest.
• Someone (s) had to pick the cotton at harvest.
• Someone (s) had to comb through the cotton by
  hand to get out the seeds, bugs, and debris
  before it could go to the spinner.
• The spinner would have to work days to take a
  bundle of cotton and spin it into a thread before
  it went to a weaver.

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• A weaver would have to spend days weaving the
  thread in to a piece of cloth before it would go
  to the dyers.
• A dyer would need to let the cloth sit for days
  in a tub of dye to get the right shade before it
  was sent to a tailor.
• A tailor would measure you, cut the cloth, and
  then spend days sewing it by hand.
• Once the shirt was done, you could go and pick up
  your new shirt and pay the tailor about 100.00
  for the shirt you are wearing.
• This 100.00 did not stay with the tailor. He
  would take his cut and send it down the line
  until it trickled through to all of the people
  who provided a service to make your shirt- down
  to the picker who got paid pennies for planting
  and picking the cotton that began your shirt.

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After 1790

• Your shirt became cheaper and you were able to
  pick them up sooner because
• In 1790, Samuel Slater opened the first cotton
  spinning textile mill in the United States. This
  allowed raw cotton, after it had the seeds
  removed, to be spun into thread to be used to
  make cloth.
• In 1793, Eli Whitney invented the cotton gin that
  could remove seeds from the cotton. This made
  what normally took a full day of work by many
  people into something that took minutes. Elis
  invention allowed the cotton to get to Slaters
  mill faster.

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• In 1813, Francis Cabot Lowell opened the first
  mill, or factory, in the world that could turn
  raw cotton into finished cloth. This allowed
  Slaters finished thread to be made into cloth
  faster which made it more affordable for
  everyone.
• Because of these inventions
• Cotton was quicker going from the plant to
  clothes on peoples backs.
• And the states in New England became the center
  of the growing textile industry because more
  entrepreneurs, or people who take risks to start
  new businesses, opened more factors in that area.
• THIS IS ONE EXAMPLE OF HOW THE INDUSTRIAL
  REVOLUTION HELPED MAKE THINGS EASIER, QUICKER,
  AND CHEAPER.

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Transportation

• Travel before 1790 would be slow and expensive.
  It took a lot of time and money to move goods to
  cities to be sold and this cost was passed onto
  the person buying the goods.
• There were two ways to travel
• water
• roads
• Water was considered easier, but it was slower
  than roads because boats could move only by wind
  or water currents.
• Roads were no good because most roads were just
  narrow dirt paths that often could not be
  traveled during certain seasons due to rain and
  ice.

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• Water travel improved in 1807 with the invention
  of the stream boat by Robert Fulton. The
  steamboat allowed boats to travel against
  currents and with more speed.
• Canals were built to meet the needs of busy
  waterways. In 1825 the Erie Canal was built to
  connect the Hudson River with Lake Erie. This
  allowed farmers and manufacturers to move their
  goods directly to New York Citys ocean port.

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• With roads, things improved some in 1815.
• In 1815, the United States built its first road
  to connect Ohio with the East. By 1833 this
  road, called the National Road, went from
  Maryland to Ohio and was paved in stone which
  made it easier to travel. It became the most
  heavily traveled road in the country.

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• The steam engine in boats lead to a steam engine
  train. A steam engine train cut trips into
  thirds. It is reported that a trip from New York
  City to Albany New York would take 32 hours by
  steamboat, but by train it only took 10 hours.
  This was considered fast travel in its days.
• By 1850, train travel also became a faster
  alternative to travel. By this time, there were
  9,000 miles of railroad tracks to connect cities,
  factories, farmers, and consumers to each other.

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• After the Industrial Revolution, we continued to
  have people move West to places like
• Texas, it become a state in the United States in
  1845 after it won its independence from Mexico in
  1836.
• Oregon, because as missionaries traveled west to
  teach American Indians about Christianity they
  wrote about how great it was and how rich the
  land was which caused about 1,000 settlers to
  head out on the Oregon Trail looking for this
  free land
• California, because in 1848 gold was found in the
  American River and 250,000 people poured into
  California to make their fame and fortune. In
  1850, the Gold Rush was over and people decided
  to stay as it too became a state in the United
  States.