Post on 15-Jan-2016
What Made it Possible?What Made it Possible?•Pacific Railway Act
– Passed July 1, 1862– Created Union Pacific to build road from the
East and meet the Central Pacific– Provided companies 5 alternating plots of
land on each side of the road for each mile along the route
– Allowed $16,000 for each mile of flat land, $32,000 for hills, and $48,000 for mountain terrain
– Revised in 1864 to allow companies more land and privileges
The Game PlanThe Game Plan•Central Pacific Railroad
– Begin in Sacramento, CA– Broke ground January 1863
•Union Pacific Railroad– Begin in Omaha, NE– Broke ground in late 1863 but no
tracks laid until 1865•Route along the 42nd Parallel•Meeting place: Promontory
Summit, UT
Significance of the RailroadSignificance of the Railroad
•Biggest and best engineering project of its time
•Made the country smaller•Helped spur interest in Homestead Act• Improved communication•The beginning of the end for Native
Americans•Led to other transcontinental railroads
and shorter branches
Morrill Land-Grant Act
• 1862• Gave millions of acres of
land to the states.– Land speculators
Money was to be used to create colleges and universities.
Justin S. Morrill (1810-1898)
Homestead Act
• Passed by Lincoln in 1862
• 160 acres – 21 years old or head of
house– House at least 12 x 14 ft– 6 months– Farm 5 years
Soddie – home made from sod
Discussion question:
What did the Morrill Land-Grant Act have in common with the
Homestead Act?
Who were the homesteaders?
• Immigrants• Freedmen
– Exodusters– Benjamin “Pap”
Singleton
Boomers
• Settlers who ran in land races to claim land
• Settlers who illegally claimed land by sneaking past the government officials
Sooners
• In the mid 1880’s, following a series of droughts, people starting returning east again.– 18,000 in 1891 alone
Women’s Suffrage
• Wyoming 1869– Would not accept statehood unless Union
allowed women to vote1893 – Colorado1896 – Idaho
Why would these states have granted women the right to vote before it was nationally recognized by the 19th Amendment?
Dawes Act
• Divided reservation land into individual plots– Each Native American family received a 160
acre plot• Granted U.S. citizenship and subject to local laws
“You ask me to cut grass and make hay and sell it, and be rich like white men! But how dare I cut off my mother’s hair?” - Smohalla
Discussion question!
What was the difference between the Native Americans and settlers in their
views about land ownership?
Indian Removal
• Pressure increased on Native American territory
• Indian Removal Act of 1830
• Forced relocation to Oklahoma Territory
• Trail of Tears
A map showing the major tribes and the routes by which the government relocated them
Buffalo
• 25 million in 1840• By 1889, around
1,100.Factors:Easy to huntBuffalo fur was popular in the East.Buffalo hide was tough, and the leather was used in
machinery. Hopes it would force the Native Americans into
farming
Native Americans
BIA – Bureau of Indian Affairs
managed delivery of critical supplies to the reservations
Disagreements and frustrations resulted in anger, some groups sought revenge.
Army life
• $13/mo
• Leftover Civil War uniforms
• Rotten food
• 1/3 deserted
Sand Creek Massacre
• 1864• Colorado Territory• Cheyenne and Arapaho Native Americans• Colonel John Chivington took 700 men to
the camped Cheyenne and Arapaho – Chief Black Kettle tried to raise a white flag of
surrender, but the army slaughtered between 150-500 people. The camp largely held women and children.
From Lt. Joseph Cramer to Maj. Edward Wynkoop, Dec. 19, 1864:
"This is the first opportunity I have had of writing you since the great Indian Massacre, and for a start, I will acknowledge I am ashamed to own I was in it...It is no use for me to tell you how the fight was managed, only I think the Officer in command should be hung...After the fight there was a sight I hope I may never see again...Bucks, woman and children, were scalped, fingers cut off to get the rings on them...little children shot, while begging for their lives...I told the Col. I thought it was murder to jump them friendly Indians. He says in reply; Damn any man or men who are in sympathy with them."
Battle of Little Bighorn
• 1876
• Also known as “Custer’s Last Stand”
• Sioux from Dakota, Wyoming and Montana Territories
Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse
2,000 Native American warriors to Custer’s little more than 200
soldiers in an hour.
“I am the last Indian.” Chief Sitting Bull
Chief Crazy Horse
Lt Colonel George Armstrong Custer 1839-1876
Ghost Dance
Purification ceremony in which people joined hands and whirled
in a circle
Sioux Indians hunting buffalo 1835
Sioux war council
Art by George Catlin
Massacre of Wounded Knee• 1890 - Sioux
• Ghost Dance
• Chief Sitting Bull– When he hesitated being arrested, he was
shot by the army officers. His followers, 120 men and 230 women & children surrendered and were rounded up. As they were being disarmed, someone fired a shot. More than 200 Sioux were killed.
Soldiers pose with three of the four Hotchkiss Guns used against the Lakota at Wounded Knee. The caption on the photograph reads:Famous Battery "K" of the 1st ArtilleryThese brave men and the Hotchkiss guns thatBig Foot's Indians thought were toys,Together with the fighting 7th what'sLeft of Gen. Custer's boys,Sent 200 Indians to thatHeaven which the ghost dancer enjoys.This checked the Indian noise,And Gen. Miles with staffReturned to Illinois.Photo by Grabill, Deadwood, South Dakota.
Assimilation
• Process by which the people of one culture merge into and become part of another culture.
Cowboys and the Gold rush
GOLD!
• Not just in California
• Colorado, Nevada – Placer mining
• Shallow, anybody could do it
Huge corporations moved in after to get the larger, underground ore deposits
Barricks Ruby Hill Mine outside Eureka, NV
Major mining strikes
Discussion
• What creates the mining boom that started with the California Gold Rush?
• Bonanza farms– Farms controlled by
large businesses that are managed by professionals and produce massive amounts of cash crops
• Dry farming – Planting crops that
don’t require very much water
Technology in Farming1860-1900
• Mechanized reaper• Barbed wire• Dry farming• Steel plow• Harrow• Steel windmill• Hybridization• Improved communication• Grain drill
Cattle boom
• Cattle barons were wealthy ranchers, owning more than 100,000 cattle.
Why would cattle be developing as such a huge industry?
Buffalo
• 25 million in 1840• By 1889, around
1,100.Factors:Easy to huntBuffalo fur was popular in the East.Buffalo hide was tough, and the leather was used in
machinery. Hopes it would force the Native Americans into
farming
Chisolm Trail The Long Drive
Factors that ended the cattle boom
• Over-expansion
• Prices dropped
• Cold winters
• Droughts
• Diseases – cattle fever
Frederick Jackson Turner
Turner Thesis
Emphasized individual effort, but down played federal involvement, Native American life, and contributions of women and other ethnic groups.
Wild West is romanticized
• Stereotypes of western heroes– Wyatt Earp– Calamity Jane– Wild Bill Hickok
William F. “Buffalo Bill” Cody
wild west shows became incredibly popular and helped shape the image of the West.
The Rise and Fall of the Populist Party
1867-1896
Farmers’ Problems:
• Lower prices for crops
• Farmers had no cash . . .went further into debt. . . foreclosed on mortgages
• Railroads charged outrageous prices to ship crops (no regulation!)
Lending practices
• Inflation– The money you pay
back is less than what you originally borrowed
• Deflation– The money you pay
back is more than what you borrowed
Example: If you borrowed $100 in 1880, you could buy 80 acres of land. What can you buy today for $100? This is inflation. Your money today is “worth less” than it was then.
Money Supply
• Money supply is the amount of money in the national economy.– If the government
increases the money supply, the value of the dollar drops
• Called Inflation
• After the Civil War, the money supply shrank– Deflation
Originally the US is on a bimetallic standard of using gold or silver coins
• Gold bugs– Conservative, big lenders
• Gold standard– Money put in
circulation was backed by gold. Less money out
• Silverites– Western miners and
farmers, called for unlimited silver dollars, hoping for better prices for selling goods.
– Free silver - unlimited silver coining
The bimetallism ratio16:1
• 16 oz. of silver is equal to 1 oz of gold
• This has fluctuated over the years, but the standard remains between 14:1 and16:1
Farmers’ Demands:
• Regulate the railroad companies! (stop them from charging such high rates)
• Make cash more available (back the dollar with silver, not gold, so dollar will be worth less)
• Political demands: single term for President and Vice-President; secret ballot; popular election of Senators
• To get industrial workers to support them: 8-hour workday; restrict immigration
Different Groups Representing Farmers’ Interests
• 1867: The Patrons of Husbandry (The Grange)
• 1880s: Farmers’ Alliance and Colored Farmers’ National Alliance
• 1892: Birth of the Populist, or People’s Party
• 1878• Bland-Allison Act
– Favored silverites, increased money supply
– Vetoed by Pres. Hayes, but Congress overrode the veto and passed it.
• Limited results. Treasury department refused to buy anymore silver to be able to circulate more.
• 1890• Sherman Silver
Purchase Act– Increased the
amount of silver the govt was required to purchase
• People turned in their notes for gold, depleting gold reserves.
Repealed by Pres. Cleveland in 1893
Mary Elizabeth Lease 1850-1933
Popular speaker for women’s suffrage, prohibition, and Populists, she told Kansas farmers to “raise a little less corn, and more hell.”
James B. Weaver (1833 – 1912)
Populist Party candidate, election of 1892
The Populist Platform
• Free silver
• Graduated income tax
• Public ownership of railroads, telegraphs and telephones
• Restricted immigration
• 8 hour workday
• Women suffrage
• Secret ballot
• Direct election of senators
Mary Elizabeth Lease (1850 – 1933)“Queen Mary” or “Mary Yellin”
Populist political activist
In Reality• Populists were not folk heroes
• The were coming up with new ideas to return America to its agrarian past (negative reform)
• Populism represented a class movement that was based on racism, anti-Semitism and sectionalism, but not nationalism
• They turned to the city only for labor support
1892 Presidential Election: Populist Candidate won over a million votes!
1896 Election
• Populists decide to improve their chances by supporting a Democratic candidate: William Jennings Bryan, who agreed to support the Silver-backed dollar. Democrats-1890s Republicans-1890s
Southerners Wealthy farmers
Low tariff (want other
countries to buy their crops)
Northerners Wealthy business
men (connected to the railroad)
Southern African
Americans (poor farmers)
High tariff (donÕt want
to compete with other countriesÕ products)
1896 Presidential Election: Bryan loses but carries most of the South and West
L. Frank Baum (1856 – 1919)author of
The Wizard of OZ
The Wizard of Ozas
Political Allegory
The characters and who they represent
Dorothy represents the American people
The Scarecrow represents the western farmers(Populists)
The Tin Woodsman represents the eastern workers, victims of mechanization
The Cowardly Lion represents William Jennings Bryan (1860 – 1925):Bryan, a Democrat, ran for the presidency in 1896 and lost to William McKinley; thus Bryan had a load roar, but no power.
The Wicked Witch of the East
Represents the eastern banking interests
=
The Wizard of Oz
William McKinley (1843 – 1901)25th President of the United States(1897 – 1901)
Marcus A. Hanna (1837 – 1904)
or
Oz
The abbreviation for an ounce of gold or silver
The Yellow Brick Roadand
Silver (not ruby!)Slippers
The Panic Ends• Congress passed a high protective tariff and the Gold
Standard Act in 1897
• Recovery began before passage of either act
• External factors:
• Increase in European demand on wheat: European wheat crop was reduced by 1/3 for 1897. . . U.S. exported more wheat; farmers were assuaged
• European money flowing into U.S. stopped the drain on gold, and new discoveries of gold in ’96 helped ease the gold problem
• Europe recovered from the depression before the U.S.
• European industries could not keep up with product demand
• U.S. began to export goods – this meant more work for U.S. industries and workers
• By 1900 prosperity was back