The Last West

1
The Last West

• 1865-1900

2
Settlement of the Last Frontier

• The Great American Desert
• Great Plains, Rockies, Western Plateau unsettled
  after Civil War
• By 1900, only Arizona, New Mexico, Oklahoma not
  states
• Settlement of the frontier can be attributed to
  three groups
• Miners
• Cattlemen and Cowboys
• Farmers

3
Mining

• California rush started a quest for gold and
  silver in the west
• Now CO, NV, ID, MT, AZ, SD
• Pikes Peak in 1859 brings 100,000 to Colorado
• Comstock Lode helps bring Nevada into the Union
  in 1864
• Will produce over 340 million in gold and silver
  by 1890

4
Effects of Mining

• Boomtowns
• Saloons, dance-hall girls, vigilante justice
• Some, like Virginia City, NV add theaters,
  newspapers, churches, libraries, schools,
  railroads and law enforcement (Mark Twain started
  here)
• Most became ghost towns after the gold and silver
  ran out
• Some, like San Francisco, Sacramento, Denver
  become important commercial centers
• Industrialnot the John Wayne Old West towns

5
Effects of Mining

• Usually ½ of a town would be foreign-born
• 1/3 of western miners were Chinese
• Resentment among native-born workers
• California 20/mo. Miners tax on foreign-born
  workers
• Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882no more Chinese
  allowed into U.S.
• Increased gold silver creates national debates
  on currency valuation
• Many visible environmental scars

6
Cattle

• Texas longhorns and methods come from Mexico and
  the vaqueros
• 5 million cattle roamed Texas because Union cut
  it off during the war
• Easy to get in on cattle business, because cattle
  and grass were free
• Railroad lines into Kansas open up eastern
  markets
• Stockyards built in Abilene, Dodge City
• Cattle driven up Chisolm, Goodnight-Loving Trails
• Cowboys (many black or Mexican) paid 1/day
• Overgrazing, blizzard/drought of 1885-86,
  barbed-wire of homesteaders end cattle drives
• Development of huge ranches, science to raise
  more tender breeds
• Overall change in American diet from pork to beef
• Legend of the Cowboy

7
Farming

• 500,000 families take advantage of Homestead Act
• Extreme temperatures
• Little wood
• Dry plains
• Grasshopper plagues

• Mud brick homes
• Barbed wire
• Mail-order windmills to dig wells
• Deep-plowing
• Hearty Russian wheat

8
Native American Removal

• U.S. government had created Reservation policies
  in the 1830s
• As miners, cattlemen, homesteaders spread west,
  fighting became inevitable
• Sand Creek, CO 1864- militia massacre Cheyenne
  women, children, men
• Sioux War 1865-1867-army column wiped out
• Treaties violated if mineral deposits found on
  Indian lands (Dakotas Black Hills)

9
Native American Conflicts

• Increased fighting in 1870s
• Red River War against Comanche
• Second Sioux War led by Sitting Bull and Crazy
  Horse
• Sioux destroy Colonel Custers command at Little
  Big Horn in 1876
• Chief Joseph tries to lead Nez Perce to
  Canadadefeated in 1877
• Slaughter of most of the buffalo by 1880 destroys
  Native American way of life
• 1881- A Century of Dishonor by Helen Hunt Jackson
  chronicles injustices, creates sympathy for
  Native Americans

10
Native Americans

• Assimilationists
• Emphasized formal education training,
  conversion to Christianity
• Carlisle School in PA designed to separate Native
  American children from their people, indoctrinate
  them to white culture
• Dawes Severalty Act (1887)
• Broke up tribal organizations
• Thought to prevent civilized behavior
• Divided land up, distributed to families
• Unfortunately, much of best land sold to settlers
• By 1900, only 200,000 Native Americans left
• Most as wards of the federal government

11
The Ghost Dance Movement

• Religious movement by Native Americans aimed at
  driving out whites from ancestral lands
• Sitting Bull (Sioux medicine man) killed during
  his arrest
• Battle (massacre) of Wounded Knee in the Dakotas,
  December 1890
• Over 200 men, women, children gunned down by U.S.
  Army
• Marks end of the Indian Wars

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Aftermath

• Full citizenship granted by federal government in
  1924
• As part of FDRs New Deal, the 1934 Indian
  Reorganization Act promoted reestablishment of
  tribal organizations culture
• Today, about 2 million Native Americans (on off
  reservations) belong to 116 tribes, each with
  over 1,000 members