Unit 7 Flashcards
Plains Indians
A diverse group of Indian tribes and their languages that inhabited the West
Sand Creek Massacre
1864: when Colorado Territory militia attacked + destroyed a village of Cheyenne & Arapaho killing and mutilating many natives
- 2/3rds were women and children.
Fort Laramie Treaty
1868
US government agrees to abandon 3 forts and the Bozeman Trail
Red Cloud agrees to move his tribe (Sioux) to a reservation stretching from the Black Hills of Dakota to the Missouri river
Custer’s Last Stand
June 1876, when Colonel George A. Custer and all his men were killed by Sioux Indians at the Battle of Little Bighorn (Custer’s Last Stand) in southern Montana.
whites motivated by gold found on reservation land
George Custer
Fought and was killed by the Sioux at the battle of Little Big Horn
Sitting Bull
- Great Soiux warrior who was one of the leaders at the Battle of Little Bighorn.
- was shot while being arrested for leading the Ghost Dance.
Helen Hunt Jackson
author of Century of Dishonor, criticized the government’s treatment of Native Americans and their violations of treaties and rights.
A Century of Dishonor
Written by Helen Hunt Jackson, this book exposed the U.S. governments many broken promises to the Native Americans.
Dawes Severalty Act
adopted by Congress in 1887, authorized the President of the United States to survey American Indian tribal land and divide it into allotments for individual Indians.
tried to destroy indian culture and unity and promote individuality instead
failed because there was no timetable and speculators took the better land from the natives
Ghost Dance Movement
Porphet Wovoka (Jack Wilson) had a vision where he saw the second coming of Christ and received warning about the evils of white man.
The last effort of Native Americans to resist US domination and drive whites from their ancestral lands.
Battle of Wounded Knee
a shot was fired which resulted in the US soliders opening fire indiscriminately from all sides, killing 300/340 natives.
ended indian wars and resistance
Mining Frontier
The discovery of gold in CA in 1848 caused the first flood of newcomers to the West. A series of gold strikes and silver strikes in what became the states of Colorado, Nevada, Idaho, Montana, Arizona, and South Dakota kept a steady flow of hopeful young prospectors pushing into the Western mountains.
Comstock Lode
a lode of silver ore located in the Virginia Range in Nevada (then western Utah Territory). It was the first major discovery of silver ore in the US.
- After the discovery, prospectors rushed to the area and scrambled to stake their claims.
- Mining camps soon thrived in the vicinity, which became bustling centers of fabulous wealth
Cattle Frontier
The migration of many people west to take up cattle ranching, which was a quick way to make cash. All you needed was a couple cows which you allowed to graze until fat & then shipped off to the east coast where meat was in high demand. This was a temporary frontier because soon the supply of cattle overwhelmed the demand.
Farming Frontier
A period of time in which hundreds of thousands of citizens moved west and began to farm the frontier, very much due to the Homestead Act of 1862, which offered 160 acres of free public land to any family that settled there for a period of 5 years.
Oklahoma Land Rush
opened the Oklahoma Territory to occupation by white settlers in 1889, displacing the Native Americans.
- resulting in a race to lay claim for a homestead
Frederick Jackson Turner
Historian, wrote one of the most influential essays ever, The Significance of the Frontier in American History
- argued that the spirit and success of the United States was directly tied to the country’s westward expansion.
Frontier Thesis
Frederick Jackson Turner’s writing on the origin of the distinctive aggressive, violent, innovative and democratic features of the American character.
- the expansion into the western frontier distinguished america from europe and was crucial in shaping our nation
Railroad Consolidation
large companies absorbed smaller ones, integrated rail networks, made everything more uniform/even/compatible
JP Morgan
a banker, dominated the boards of competing railroad corporations through interlocking directorates
- bought out carnegie