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Manifest Destiny

Discover the westward expansion of America in the 1800s, as white settlers ventured beyond the Appalachian Mountains, claimed new lands, and encountered Native Americans along the way.

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Manifest Destiny

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  1. Manifest Destiny

  2. Settling New Lands • In 1800 387,000 white settlers lived West of the Appalachian Mountains • By 1820, the number had grown to 2.4 million • By the time the Civil War starts, more people live West of the Appalachian Mountains than East • In 1845 a magazine editor declared that it was the ‘manifest destiny’ of Americans to settle the entire continent

  3. Farming New Lands • Early farmers marked out farms on land they didn’t own • They were known as Squatters • Congress wanted to sell the land to real-estate companies • After pressure from the public, Congress passed the Preemption Act of 1830, which allowed the right to claim land before it was surveyed and purchase up to 160 acres

  4. Plows and Reapers • Advancements in plows cut the labor needed to prepare land in half • John Deere engineered the new standard in plows in 1837 • Cyrus McCormick patented the mechanical reaper in 1834, which allowed farmers to cut wheat at a much faster pace with less effort

  5. Settling the Pacific Coast • Latecomers to the Midwest found little land to settle and set their sights on the Pacific Coast • Many settlers focused on the Oregon Country • Missionaries were the first to arrive in Oregon and they spread word to come to the Willamette Valley

  6. Westward Migration • By the late 1840s, there were several main East-to-West trails • The most popular was the Oregon Trail • Others included the California Trail and the Santa Fe Trail • Emigrants traveled in a group of covered wagons known as a wagon train • The typical trip west took five to six months with wagon trains progressing about 15 miles per day

  7. Native Americans • Early travelers feared attacks by Native Americans, but violent encounters were very rare • Native Americans often gave emigrants gifts of food, as well as information about the route and edible plants • Native Americans worried about the wagon traffic disrupting the buffalo migration • The Treaty of Fort Laramie in 1851 ensured 8 Native American groups that they would keep their land as long as they let settlers pass through peacefully

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