Chapter 16 - Conquering a Continent, 1854-1890

Question 1

William Seward

Answer 1

Secretary of State under Lincoln and Johnson; advocated for asserting U.S. power in Latin America and Asia via trade

Question 2

Emmeline Wells

Answer 2

Mormon woman who led the women’s suffrage movement in Utah - in 1870, it became second state to grant women the vote (after Wyoming)

Question 3

John Wesley Powel

Answer 3

leader of a surveying expedition in the West and author of Lands of the Arid Region of the United States

Question 4

Chief Joseph

Answer 4

Nez Perce tribe leader who attempted to lead his people in fleeing to Canada after being forcibly removed from their ancestral land by the federal government

Question 5

Sitting Bull

Answer 5

Lakota chief who led his people in their resistance to the federal government

Question 6

George Armstrong Custer

Answer 6

officer in the American Indian Wars and leader of the charge in the Battle of Little Big Horn

Question 7

Geronimo

Answer 7

Apache leader who resisted reservation life

Question 8

Ohiyesa (Dr. Charles Eastman)

Answer 8

Indian student who became a doctor and worked side by side with traditional healers

Question 9

Buffalo Bill Cody

Answer 9

influential myth-maker about the “Wild West”

Question 10

Frederick Jackson Turner

Answer 10

historian who proclaimed the end of the “frontier” (a constantly westward-moving line that existed between civilization and savagery) in 1890

Question 11

transcontinental railroad

Answer 11

unbroken rail line from the Atlantic to the Pacific

Question 12

protective tariff

Answer 12

a tax on foreign goods coming into the U.S., giving U.S. manufacturers a competitive advantage

Question 13

Treaty of Kanagawa

Answer 13

allowed U.S. ships to refuel at two Japanese ports, opening trade between the countries

Question 14

Burlingame Treaty

Answer 14

treaty between U.S. and China which guaranteed the rights of U.S. missionaries in China and set official terms for the emigration of Chinese laborers

Question 15

Munn v. Illinois

Answer 15

Supreme Court affirmed that states could regulate key businesses if they were “clothed in the public interest”

Question 16

gold standard

Answer 16

a system where paper notes are backed by gold held in a bank’s vaults

Question 17

Crime of 1873

Answer 17

law directing the U.S. Treasury to cease minting silver dollars, retire greenbacks, and replace greenbacks with notes backed by the gold standard

Question 18

Homestead Act

Answer 18

gave 160 acres of federal land to any applicant who occupied and improved the property

Question 19

Morrill Act

Answer 19

set aside 140 million federal acres that states could sell to raise money for public universities

Question 20

land-grant colleges

Answer 20

public universities created with the funds of lands sales; they aimed to broaden educational opportunities and foster scientific and technical expertise

Question 21

Comstock Lode

Answer 21

an immense silver ore deposit discovered in 1859 in Nevada, bringing a diverse population to the region

Question 22

General Mining Act of 1872

Answer 22

allowed those who discovered minerals on federal land to work the claim and keep all proceeds

Question 23

boomtown

Answer 23

mining town

Question 24

Long Drive

Answer 24

system by which cowboys herded cattle hundreds of miles north from Texas to Kansas

Question 25

“rain follows the plow”

Answer 25

idea that settlement in drier areas increased rainfall

Question 26

Exodusters

Answer 26

African Americans who left the Deep South after the Civil War to settle on farms in places like Kansas

Question 27

Yellowstone National Park

Answer 27

the first national park; founded largely due to railroad tourism

Question 28

U.S. Fisheries Commission

Answer 28

organization founded to make recommendations to stem the decline in wild fish

Question 29

Sand Creek Massacre

Answer 29

1864 massacre of over 100 peaceful Cheyennes (mostly women and children) by John M. Chivington’s Colorado militia

Question 30

Fetterman Massacre

Answer 30

massacre of over 80 soldiers by Sioux warriors; resulted in the closing of the Bozeman Trail (main route into Montana)

Question 31

Lone Wolf v. Hitchcock

Answer 31

Supreme Court ruling that Congress could make whatever Indian policies it chose and ignore existing treaties

Question 32

Daws Severalty Act of 1887

Answer 32

gave Natives severalty by dividing reservations into homesteads

Question 33

Battle of Little Big Horn

Answer 33

1876 battle occurring when American cavalry attacked an encampment of Indians who resisted removal to a reservation (Indians won)

Question 34

Ghost Dance Movement

Answer 34

movement in which Native Americans believed they could perform sacred dances to resurrect the bison and call a great storm to drive the whites back across the Atlantic

Question 35

Wounded Knee

Answer 35

1890 massacre of Sioux Indians by American cavalry at Wounded Knee Creek, South Dakota