The Transformation of the Trans-Mississippi West, 1860 – 1900

1. The Transformation of the Trans-Mississippi West, 1860 – 1900 Chapter 17

2. Maxidiwiac • Also called Buffalo Bird Woman • Born 1843 in N. Dakota, found changes overwhelming • Lewis and Clark wintered with tribe 1804; impressed by them but were decimated by small pox and Dakota Sioux • After Civil war whites crowded onto their lands • 1870 moved to Fort Berthold, Indian reservation • Settlement of trans-Mississippi West began with removal of natives • Whites prospered on Plains, but threatened Natives and environment • Westerners felt they were self-reliant, but development of this region depended heavily on: • troops to subjugate Indians • Homestead Act of 1862 • Subsidized transcontinental RR

3. Native Americans and the Trans-Mississippi West • Transformation of west best visible by destruction of traditional Indian way of life • by 1890s confinement to reservation was fate of almost every Indian nation, but they attempted to preserve their customs and rebuild their numbers

4. Analyze What do you see in this photo? What impact would this have on Native American culture in the west? Why? 2 minutes

5. The Plains Indians • Indians of Great Plains inhabited three major regions • Northern Plains • Central Plains: Five Civilized Tribes • Southern Plains • A lot of diversity, customs varied from tribe to tribe • Life revolved around family ties, tribal cooperation, respect, decisions by consensus • Sioux religion complex – thought of life as a series of circles; believed in hierarchy of spirits whose help could be invoked by the Sun Dance • Bison and natives adapted to the environment • 15 million bison supplied Natives with food, clothing, tipi covers, buffalo robes (trading commodity) • 1860s whites began to systematically hunt bison • Killed to feed RR construction crews, undermine Indian resistance; for skins – destroyed Indian way of life

6. The Assault on Nomadic Indian Life • 1850s federal government reexamined its Indian policies • Sought to introduce smaller tribal reservations– by 1860 8 reservations created – some fought removal – led to Indian Wars • Sand Creek, CO 1864 – soldiers destroyed camps, Indians retaliated, November 29 Chivington’s troops massacred peaceful band • 1866 Sioux War – Captain Fetterman’s column killed by Sioux warriors • Massacres rekindled debate over Indian policy, Congress 1867 set aside 2 reserves where Indians to take up farming and convert – any that refused was threatened by Commissioner of Indian Affairs Ely • 68,000 Natives signed Medicine Lodge Treaty of 1867; 1868 bands of Sioux signed Fort Laramie Treaty but many refused to leave • August 1868 war parties raided settlements; army retaliated; Custer struck sleeping Cheyenne village • 1869 Congress created Board of Indian Commissioners – but Indians left reservations, agents unable to restrain scheming whites; Congress abolished treaty and passed Indian Appropriate Act of 1871 • Caught in ambiguous and deceptive federal policy Natives launched Red River War • In SW Apache fought guerrilla war until their leader, Geronimo, surrendered in 1886

7. Answer Pretend you are in charge of creating policy for dealing with the “Indian Problem.” What could you have done differently or is there nothing that could have been done? 2 minutes

8. Custer’s Last Stand, 1876 • Battles waged by western Sioux tribes bloodiest • 1868 Treaty of Fort Laramie set aside Great Sioux Reserve “in perpetuity” but not all bands signed treaty • 1873 Chief Red Cloud’s and Chief Spotted Tail’s bands managed to stay on traditional lands - found powerful leader in Sitting Bull • In 1874 Sherman sent Custer to Black Hills to get concessions – November 1875 negotiations broke down; then sought to drive them out • June 1876 - 600 troops and Custer went to Little Bighorn Riverto fight Cheyenne and Sioux – Custer was outnumbered and wiped out • “Custer’s Last Stand”; some questioned Indian policy; others worried about retaliation, most wanted to end rebellion • Sioux harassed for 5 years; Sitting Bull surrendered 1881 when trying to escape to Canada for lack of provisions as did Chief Joseph in 1877 • Chief Dull Knife led 150 survivors – army jailed them – when denied request to stay nearer to traditional lands leaders refused to cooperate – post commander withheld all food, water, and fuel • January 1879 Dull Knife shot guards and tried to escape – soldiers chased them and gunned ½ down including Dull Knife • Indian resistance continued to 1900 but brutal tactics sapped will to resist

9. Saving the Indians • Some outraged by government violation of Indian treaties; Women’s National Indian Rights Association founded 1883 took up cause • Helen Hunt Jackson’s A Century of Dishonor • Created Indian boarding schools like Richard Henry Pratt – opened a school in Carlisle, PA 1879 – believed Natives’ customs halted progress • Often backfired – formed friendships with other tribes; forged identity • Others felt breaking up the reservations would benefit Natives – tried to end the problem by ending Natives as a culturally distinct entity • Dawes Severalty Act – 1887 - sought to turn Natives into landowners and farmers – distributed 160 acres of land for farming or 320 land for grazing to each head of an Indian family • Didn’t specify a timetable – gave Natives 47 million acres but gave whites 90 million acres • Some Natives prospered enough to expand their holdings but countless others struggled just to survive

10. analyze Why is this photo ironic? How could it be used as a SYNTHESIS point for a DBQ? 2 minutes

11. The Ghost Dance and the End of Indian Resistance on the Great Plains, 1890 • Conditions for Sioux worsened late 1880s –government reduced meat rations and restricted hunting - 25,000 Sioux turned to Wovoka • Said to return to traditional ethics and taught followers cycle of ritual songs and dance steps called the Ghost Dance • Fall 1890 Ghost Dance movement spread – Indian officials alarmed – decided Chief Sitting Bull was a rallying point – December dispatched Native police to take him into custody • Shots fired and Sitting Bull was mortally wounded, December 29 the 7th Cavalry rounding up 340 starving and freezing Sioux at Wounded Knee, ND and a shot was fired – soldiers responded with cannon fire and within minutes 300 Natives were killed • Irony was that some did try to adapt to Non-Indian ways; other struggled with poverty and driven onto reservations • By 1900 population shrunk from 250,000 to 100,000 • Unlike Sioux, Navajos of SW adjusted more successfully

12. Answer Create a list of the top three laws, treaties, or issues that prevented the Native Americans and the Americans to reach a compromise on the “Indian Problem”. 2 minutes

13. Settling the West • Removal of Indians opened vast territory for settlement • 1840s nearly ¼ million American trudged overland to Oregon and CA with a 6-8 month trip on wagon • by 1870s RR expansion made trip faster and easier

14. First Transcontinental Railroad • 1862 Pacific Railroad Act authorized construction of new transcontinental link - accelerated transformation of everyday life west of the Mississippi • Union Pacific – Grenville Dodge – used war veterans and Irish • Central Pacific – Charles Crocker – used Chinese – preferred them because they worked hard for low wages, didn’t drink, and furnished own food and tents • May 10, 1869 celebrated as they met at Promontory Point Utah • Southern Pacific (1883), Northern Pacific (1883), Santa Fe (1883), and Great Northern (1893) also built

15. Settlers and the Railroad • Congress awarded railroads 170 million acres; Minnesota and Washington deeded ¼ of state lands; railroads had opportunity to shape settlement • Railroads set up land sales offices and sent agents to recruit settlers • Offered long-term loans and free transportation west, did admit life was lonely so said to bring wives and emigrate as entire families with friends • One unintended consequence was making land available to single women – in Wyoming single women made up more than 18% of claimants • RR helped bring nearly 2.2 million foreign-born settlers West between 1870-1900 - some agents recruited whole villages • Urged farmers to specialize in cash crops – initially brought highrevenues but became dependent on single crop

16. Homesteading on the Great Plains • Liberalized land laws pulled settlers westward • 1862 Homestead Act - offered 160 acres for $10 and 5 years • 400,000 families claimed land 1860 -1900 but law didn’t work as intended –speculators filed false claims and railroads got lots of land, only 1 acre for every 9 went to the pioneers • 160 acre limit created problem – drier areas needed more land so 1873 Congress passed Timber Culture Act - gave additional 160 acres if they planted trees on 40 acres • Desert Land Act 1877 and Timber and Stone Act of 1878 attempted to get land to settlers but abused by speculators, ranchers, lumber companies • Settlers faced difficult psychological adjustments to frontier life • Nearly ½ that staked homestead claims in Kansas 1862 -1890 gave up • 2/3 of all homesteaders failed by 1900 • Those that stayed identified deeply with the land

17. New Farms, New Markets • Took advantage of farm mechanization and improved strains of wheat and corn to boost production - enabled production to grow 10x • Barbed wire – 1874 – keep livestock out of their crops – touched off clashes between farmers and cattle ranchers • Invention of labor saving machinery with increased demand for products created impression that farming had unparalleled prosperity but costs to start up could exceed $1,200 - many had to specialize in cash crops, made them dependent on the railroads and at mercy of the grain market • Weather exacerbated difficulties – used “dry farming” to help – also built windmills and diverted creeks for irrigation but onset of very dry years and grasshopper infestations along with economic depression from 1873-1878 made plight of some desperate

18. Building a Society and Achieving Statehood • Remote farm settlements became communities; cooperation was necessity and form of insurance • When population increased, lobbied to turn territory into a state – required residents to petition Congress to pass enabling act and elect delegates for a state constitutional convention – once state constitution had been draw up and ratified by popular vote, territory applied to Congress for admission as a state • Although socially conservative, new states supported woman’s suffrage –Wyoming – enfranchised women 1869 • By 1910 4 states - Idaho, Wyoming, Utah, and Colorado - granted women full voting rights

19. Answer 2 minutes Why would the west want to give women the right to vote?

20. Spread of Mormonism • 1847 Mormons escaped persecution by moving to the Great Salt Lake Valley; led by Brigham Young and a Council of Twelve Apostles • Emphasized self-sufficiency and commitment to family • Recruitment in Europe boosted numbers to 100,000 • Had increasing conflict with non-Mormons and the US government • Sought to be economically independent so1869 developed own railroad, set up Zion’s Cooperative Mercantile Intuition, created People’s Party • Series of federal acts challenged authority of the church • Morrill Anti-Bigamy Act 1862 • United States v. Reynolds • 1887 Edmunds-Tucker Act • In response church publically announced official end of polygamy –dissolved People’s Party and supported statehood • Confiscated church property and voting rights restored, jailed polygamists pardoned, but balance between sacred and secular shifted

21. Southwestern Borderlands • Annexation of Texas and Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo immense territory • US promised to protect Mexican property, but over next 30 years forced much of the Spanish speaking population off the land • TX legacy of bitterness – 1848 cotton planters confiscated Mexican lands and began racist campaign that labeled Mexicans as nonwhite • 1859 Juan Cortina attacked Brownsville, TX and freed all prisoners – he battled US army until fearing invasion, Mexico jailed him in 1875 • In CA flood and drought, slumping cattle industry ruined large ranches owned by californios – forced many to retreat into barrios • White legislators passed laws that made ownership of land difficult for non-Anglos - Mexicans, Natives, Chinese faced discrimination, manipulation, exclusion • Cultural adaption more smooth in Arizona and NM with wealthy Mexicans • 1880s Las GorrasBlancas – tore up railroad tracks, attacked both Anglo newcomers and upper-class Hispanics • Mexican-American men forced to search for seasonal migrant work; women took responsibility for holding families and communities together • Violence and discrimination against Spanish speaking citizens in SW escalated in 1890s – labeled Mexican Americans as violent and lazy

22. Answer Why was the stereotype of a “lazy” and “shiftless” immigrant from Mexico created? Why is this ironic? 2 minutes

23. Exploiting the Western Landscape • Displacement of Mexican-American and Natives opened the way for exploitation of the natural environment • Promised unheard of wealth but set in motion boom-and-bust economy

24. The Mining Frontier • Beginning with CA Gold Rush series of mining booms swept from SW to Alaska • 1853 Henry Comstock, stumbled on Comstock Lode • Over next 50 years gold found in CO, ID, MT, WY, SD and Canada • Western mining camps melting pots • Few prospectors became wealthy • Life in mining towns was vibrant but unpredictable • Gold rush mania spurred growth of Alaska – discovery in Canadian Klondike 1897 brought thousands and enabled Alaska to establish its own territorial government in 1912 • Miners typically made $2,000 a year but work was very dangerous • Polluted the rivers, scarred the landscape, dug up mercury and cyanide, spewed smoke containing lead, arsenic, and other chemicals

25. Cowboys and the Cattle Frontier • Cattle ranching grew at huge rate - promoted as route to fortune- cowboy was now glorified • 1868 Joseph G. McCoy – revolutionized cattle industry • McCoy built new stockyard in Abilene; guaranteed to transport his steers in railcars east so got $5 kickback per car • He helped survey and shorten the Chisholm Trail in Kansas • He organized first Wild West show • Cattle drives of the 1860s and 1870 could bring $30,000 profit • But lived at mercy of market and panic of 1873 they went bankrupt • Cowboys were men in teens and twenties, worked for 1-2 years, earned $30 a month, nearly 1/5 were black or Mexican and braved gangs of cattle thieves like Billy the Kid • One famous cowboy was Nat Love – son of TN slaves • Cattle bonanza peaked 1880 – 1885 – produced 4.5 million head of cattle • 1885 and 1886 cold winters with summer droughts and Texas fever destroyed nearly 90% of the cattle • Cattle industry lived on, but railroad expansion brought the days of the open range and great cattle drives to an end

26. Answer Why is the image of the West as wild and untamed a part of American folklore? 2 minutes

27. Cattle Towns and Prostitutes • One legacy of cattle boom was growth of cities – some had periods of early violence but towns quickly established police • In Abilene city ordinances forbade carrying firearms and regulated saloons, gambling, prostitution • James B. “Wild Bill” Hickok served as town marshal in 1871 • Overall homicide rates were not that high • Did experience prostitution as did most cities at this time • Some became prostitutes to escape domestic violence or due to economic hardship; others were forced into the trade • All risked venereal disease, physical abuse, drug and alcohol addiction • As towns settled, women in other occupations increased

28. Bonanza Farms • Wheat boom of 1870s and 1880s started small but rapidly attracted large investments- produced nation’s first agribusinesses • Boom in Dakota Territory began during Panic of 1873 - Northern Pacific Railroad exchanging land for its depreciated bonds • Speculators established factory-like ten-thousand-acre farms each run by hired manager • Publicity generated by success of a few large investors led to wheat boom in 1880 – everyone rushed to buy land – but collapsed fast • Large scale farms most successful in CA Central Valley – used canals and other irrigation systems and grew higher-priced specialty crops • By 1900 were shipping fruits and vegetables in refrigerated train cars

29. The Oklahoma Land Rush, 1889 • Indian Territory –reserved for Five Civilized Tribes but most of these tribes sided with Confederacy – were punished by settling other tribes on their lands • 1889 Congress transferred to federally owned public domain 2 million acres that hadn’t been specifically assigned to any tribe • Noon April 22, 1889 thousands stampeded into land to stake out homesteads • 9 weeks later 6,000 homestead claims filed – Dawes Severalty Act broke up the Indian reservations and opened up surplus to settlement • Curtis Act 1898 dissolved Indian Territory and abolished tribal governments • Within two generations a combination of exploitative farming, poor land management,and sporadic drought would place Oklahomaat center of dust bowl of the 1930s

30. The West of Life and Legend • 1893 Frederick Jackson Turner delivered lecture called “The Significance of the Frontier in American History” • Said the frontier was gone • His idealized view of the West reflected ideas popular among his contemporaries in the 1890s (although they were wrong)

31. The American Adam and the Dime-Novel Hero • Late 19th century writers presented frontiersman as kind of mythic American Adam – simple, virtuous, and innocent – untainted by a corrupt social order • Was seen as a place of adventure where could escape from society and its pressures • Authors of dime novels of 1860s and 1870s began to offer image of western frontiersman as new masculine ideal, tough guy that fights for truth and honor • William F. Buffalo Bill Cody organized his own Wild West show in 1883 – he toured East Coast and Europe

32. Revitalizing the Frontier Legend • Eastern writers and artists embraced both versions of the myth – place of escape from society and stage on which the moral conflicts confronting society were played out • Three members of the eastern establishment – Theodore Roosevelt, Frederic Remington, and Owen Wister – spent a lot of time in the West in the 1880s and each was impacted • Roosevelt glorified frontier in books like The Winning of the West and Remington in his statues and painting • Exalted the disappearing frontier as proving ground for manhood and last outpost of an honest and true social order • Owen Wister’s popular novel The Virginian (1902) – an unnamed cowboy hero who helped the weak and fought the wicked – was a Christian knight on the Plains • These were all idealized versions of the West and it glossed over the hard work and dark sides of frontier expansion

33. Beginning a National Parks Movement • Wister’s work reinforced growing recognition that many unique features of the western landscape were being threatened – began surge of public support for creating national parks and beginning conservation • Major John Wesley Powell – Report on the Lands of the Arid Regions of the United States (1878) argued settlers needed to readjust their expectations about the use of water in the dry terrain; urged Congress to create governmental control of watersheds, irrigation, and public lands • Adventurers led by General Henry D. Washburn visited near Yellowstone River – abandoned plan to claim the area for Northern Pacific Railroad and petitioned Congress to protect it - 1872 Congress created Yellowstone National Park • Man and Nature 1864 George Perkins Marsh attacked view that nature existed to be tamed and conquered, his pleas for conservation found support with John Muir – became late 19th century’s most articulate publicist for wilderness protection – contributed strongly to creating of Yosemite National Park in 1890 • Later became president of the Sierra Club – organization created to encourage the enjoyment and protection of the wilderness

34. Answer What discoveries and developments prompted the establishment of national parks? 2 minutes