Chapter 3, Lesson 3 Cowboys and Miners

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Chapter 3, Lesson 3Cowboys and Miners

• 5th Grade

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Essential Question

• How did cattle drives and a search for gold offer
  new opportunities and lead to changes in the U.S.?

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Places

• Dodge City, Kansas
• Chicago, Illinois
• Denver, Colorado
• Virginia City, Nevada

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People

• Charles Goodnight
• Nat Love
• Luzena Stanley Wilson
• Levi Strauss
• Mark Twain

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Vocabulary

• Cattle drive
• Gold Rush
• Entrepreneur

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Cowboy Life

• Longhorn cattle sold for 4.00 in Texas but
  40.00 in the east.
• Cowboys began the cattle drive or guiding herds
  of cattle north to the railroad.
• The cattle drive began in Texas and ended in
  railroad town like Dodge City, Kansas.
• The cattle was then placed on trains and sold in
  the east.

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Cowboy Life

• Ranchers like Charles Goodnight established cow
  trails.
• Cowboy life was hard but offered adventure.
• Cowboys had to care for the animals both cows and
  horses.
• Freed slaves like Nat Love found a life as a
  cowboy.

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The End of the Drives

• Cattle drives came to an end in the late 1880s
• One reason was a conflict between farmers and
  ranchers.
• Farmers used barbed wire to keep the cattle away
  from their crops and water.
• Railroads in Texas also helped end the cattle
  drives.

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The End of the Drives

• Although the cattle drives were over the cattle
  business was still a big business.
• The railroads made places like Chicago, Illinois
  important to ranchers.
• The cattle was delivered to Chicago and from
  there fresh meat was delivered all over the
  country.

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Dreams of Gold

• People who moved to the west helped change the
  country.
• People like Luzena Stanley Wilson moved her
  family to California to look for gold in 1849.
• During the gold rush, thousands of people went to
  California to look for gold.
• People felt that gold may be found in other parts
  of the country as well.

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Dreams of Gold

• In a small creek near Denver, Colorado, gold was
  also found.
• People from all over began moving to all parts of
  the west.
• Miners scooped sand from the bottom of streams
  looking for gold dust.

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Boomtowns and Blue Jeans

• Miners were quick to rush to towns were gold was
  found.
• As people rushed into towns it created a boom or
  a period of quick economic gain. Boomtowns
  offered many opportunities.
• Entrepreneurs began opening business in these
  boomtowns.
• One such entrepreneur was Levi Strauss

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Boomtowns and Blue Jeans

• Levi Strauss found that miners wanted sturdy
  pants. He made pants out of blue denim and rivets
  to hold the pants together.
• These were the first blue jeans.
• One of the biggest boomtowns was Virginia City,
  Nevada when gold and silver was discovered there.

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Boomtowns and Blue Jeans

• A writer named Mark Twain arrived in 1862, years
  before he became famous.
• The boomtowns did not last, creating a bust or a
  ghost town.

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Review Questions

• Why did ranchers decide to drive cattle from
  Texas to towns along the railroad?
• What changes brought cattle drives to an end?