Trails West Who went West & Why?

1. Trails West Who went West & Why?

3. Popular Trails • Santa Fe • California • Old Spanish Trail • Mormon Trail • Oregon Trail

4. Key Terms • Mountain Man • Land Speculators • South Pass • Fort Vancouver • Santa Fe Trail • William Becknell • Conestoga Wagons • Oregon Trail • Emigrant’s Guide • Mormons • Joseph Smith • Church of Christ of Latter Day Saints • Polygamy • Brigham Young • Salt Lake City, Utah

5. Mountain Man • Definition: name given to adventurers who trapped furs and traded goods in and around the Rocky Mountains • Hardships and dangers • Alone, or a few companions • Trackers and Pathfinders • Tough • Got along well with Native-Americans • Independent

6. Mountain Men • Spent most of the year alone, trapping beavers for beaver skin hats, popular at the time. • Rendezvous system – Businessmen from the East would meet trappers and sell them supplies while being paid in furs; 1825-1840. • Explored Far West looking for new streams – their knowledge and the trails they blazed made it possible for later pioneers to move west. Jim Beckwourth

7. Jedediah Smith • Mountain man who led a party of hunters to western WY in fall of 1823 , failed • Search for South Pass, a low and open area through the Rockies that wagons could get through • 1827 headed for CA, jailed by Mexicans as a spy, released 1828, head along the coast of OR, most killed by N-As, Smith and a few others reach Fort Vancouver on the Columbia in OR country • Since 1790s, GB & US claim, 1818, occupy the area together • 1820s Hudson Bay Co. of CA firm control of the area • Smith sends letter to U.S. government warning that GB is taking over the area, says wagons can cross!!!

8. Santa Fe, New Mexico, Missouri to Santa Fe • Mexican lands open to American traders • Missouri trader, William Becknell “Father of the Santa Fe Trail” sets out with his goods-large profits, rumors spread, more traders come to the area! • First Western traders use Conestoga wagons on the trail • Many Americans stayed and brought skills= prosperity to the area

9. The Oregon Trail &The Missionaries • Groups who first came West to convert native people to Christianity and teach white ways. • The best known missionaries were Marcus & Narcissa Whitman & Henry and Eliza Spalding. They made the journey west from St. Louis in 1836. • Very few Indians became Christian, but the missionaries reports of a “Pioneer’s Paradise” helped to convince many Americans to make the journey.

10. Oregon Trail, Independence, Missouri to the OR territory • Reports of rich farmland • GB & U.S. occupy the territory • 1843 people flood the OR country, leading to conflicts • The Emigrant’s Guide

11. Mormons • Joseph Smith, founder of the Church of Christ of Latter Day Saints • Large following in Kirtland, OH • Polygamy • 1844 IL mob kills Smith • Brigham Young leads the Mormons West on the Mormon Trail in the Great Migration in 1847, settle in Salt Lake City, Utah

12. The Mormons • Members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints founded in N.Y. by Joseph Smith in 1830. • Wherever they settled, they were persecuted by the neighbors who disagreed with their beliefs or resented their growing wealth and power. • The church has grown into a worldwide religion with over 7 million members.

13. Lure of the West • Land speculators – Bought huge areas of land hoping they would become valuable and would break them up to sell to settlers for a large profit. • Manufacturers and merchants – hoped to make and sell supplies for farmers moving west. • Others – new beginnings; find jobs; get away from clutter of city; avoid paying people whom they owed money. • Religion- Freely practice religion without being persecuted.