Closing the Frontier Flashcards
1
Q
The Homestead Act of 1862
A
Granted a quarter section of the public land free to any household head who lived on the land for at least five years and improved it.
2
Q
The Morrill Act of 1862
A
Created colleges for the scientific study of soil, grain, and climate conditions.
3
Q
Oklahoma Land Rush
A
- The conclusion of Worcester v. Georgia and the Indian Removal Act.
- Required five major native American nations known as the “Civilized Tribes” (Cherokee, Seminole, Chickasaws, Choctaws, and Creeks) to relocate to Oklahoma.
4
Q
April 22nd, 1889 (Oklahoma Land Rush continued)
A
- Settlers poured into Oklahoma, known as “Sooners.”
- These settlers were homesteaders, land companies, and those dispossessed by warfare/economic hardship in the South.
- Natives were once again, forcibly removed from their land.
5
Q
Curtis Act
A
- Abolished tribal jurisdiction over all Indian territory.
- Forced members of Indian nations to dismantle their governments and abandon their estates.
- Subjected them to federal law.
6
Q
Grant’s Peace Policy
A
- Grant wanted to either relocate Natives to reservations or assimilate them to U.S. customs, traditions, and citizenship.
- Federal Government wanted to make schools and establish a new economy for Native Americans to “Americanize” them.
- Hired Quakers to government positions to help educate Native Americans.
7
Q
Indian Territory & Reservation Policy
A
- Reservations were lands granted to Native American nations that would be ran by the tribal nation under the supervision of the Department of Indian Affairs rather than the state.
- They would receive funding from the Federal government, like a state would, however the funding throughout the 19th century was routinely insufficient which often led these tribal communities malnourished and ill-supplied.
8
Q
Pacific Railroad Acts of 1862, 1864, & 1867
A
- Allowed for funding of America’s Transcontinental Railroad which was completed in 1869.
- Connected San Francisco, California, to Omaha, Kansas, and hooked-up with other railways back east.
- Allowed for goods and people to move faster throughout the country than ever before.
9
Q
Farming Improvements
A
- Refrigerated rail cars
- John Deere’s Singing Plow (turned grass in the great plains into soil)
- The harvester
- The reaper
- Farms became more like factories
10
Q
Impacts of mass farming
A
- Because farms acted like factories, a low-paying workforce was necessary.
- Chinese and migrant farmers were used.
- Animals like grizzle bears, wolves, and buffalo died off.
- More and more water was needed to supply farms (led to irrigation systems which would dry-up the nearby lakes/streams).
11
Q
The Forrest Reserve Act of 1891
A
Gave the President the power to establish forest reserves to protect watersheds against the threats posed by lumbering, overgrazing, and forest fires.
12
Q
The Sand Creek Massacre
A
- As the 1850s and 1860s progressed, more miners were moving into Colorado to search the Rocky Mountains for gold.
- In November of 1865, U.S. troops attacked a village of Native Americans consisting of Arapaho and Cheyenne tribes in Colorado.
- Violated the Treaty of Fort Laramie of 1851 (lands in Colorado were promised to both the Arapaho and Cheyenne tribes)
13
Q
Black Kettle
A
- Cheyenne chief who negotiated new deals with the U.S. Government from 1851-1864.
14
Q
The Sioux Wars (1850s-60s)
A
- Sioux and Cheyenne forces led by Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse, two Sioux chiefs, began attacks on forts from Utah all the way to Montana.
- Conflict between the Sioux people and U.S.
15
Q
Treaty of Fort Laramie (1868)
A
- Sioux and Cheyenne forces agree to leave the forts, and stop raiding U.S. forces/towns.
- U.S. troops would allow Sioux and Cheyenne forces to live peacefully throughout the area.
- These tribes were still forced off of the land as the Transcontinental Railroad brought more and more people westward.
16
Q
Medicine Lodge Treaty of 1867
A
Promised Southern Cheyenne, Comanche, Arapaho, and Kiowa (all nomadic tribes) lands south of the Arkansas River for purpose of hunting buffalo.
17
Q
The Red River War
A
- After the Medicine Lodge Treaty, Hostilities were settling down from the Sand Creek Massacre in Colorado.
- Commercial buffalo hunters began wiping out the population of buffalo, which led to a smaller food source for the Native American tribes.
- Federal Government also failed to provide enough food, weapons, and materials for housing that was promised from the treaty.
- The Comanche organized war parties to go to war against the Federal troops
- Comanche were defeated and forced to surrender at Fort Sill, in Oklahoma.
18
Q
The Sioux Wars (1870s-80s)
A
- The discovery of gold in the Black Hills mines of Wyoming and South Dakota brought more and more people (miners) to the area.
- With more and more people encroaching on Native American lands, the Sioux Wars once again erupted between the Sioux/Cheyenne and the Federal government.
19
Q
Colonel George B. Custer
A
- A very enthusiastic and colorful characters in the Sioux Wars.
- Renowned for his bravery.
- Was given orders to scout the Sioux tribes at Little Bighorn, but ended up leading an attack against overwhelming Sioux forces.
- In the East and West, Custer was viewed as a martyr.
- Public perception of Native Americans reached an all-time low.
20
Q
The Massacre at Wounded Knee
A
- December 29th, 1890, Federal troops surrounded the Lakota and opened fire, on a group consisting mostly of women, children and the elderly over 250 people were killed.
- Only about 50 children survived.
- The surviving children were put in the Carlisle Indian Industrial School.
