Life on the Plains

1. Life on the Plains NCSCOS Goal 4 Page 29

2. gNative American Removal opened up this land for my family…but was it justified? Answer the following questions under your objective Check yourself Review What were some reasons settlers moved out West? Which battle ended Native American resistance on the plains What was the goal of the Dawes Act? How was Helen Hunt Jackson similar to Harriet Beecher Stowe (not 3 names either)

3. Homestead Act • Passed in 1862 • -to encourage settlement of the Plains area • -gave 160 acres of land to settlers if they improved the land and lived on it • To any citizen or intended citizen who was the head of household • Must farm the land for 5 years • -land speculators • People who use land for profit • -Oklahoma giveaway, 1889 • One day land-grab of 2 million acres that formerly belonged to the Natives • “Boomers” and “Sooners” • -people continued to come for the cheap lands and opportunity

4. 55 Indian nations had been forced into Indian Territory, which contained the largest unsettled farmland in the U.S. (about 2 million unassigned acres). During the 1880s, squatters overran the land, and Congress agreed to buy out the Indian claims to the land. On the morning of April 22, 1889, tens of thousands of homesteaders lined up at the territory’s borders. At the stroke of noon, bugles blew, pistols fired, and the eager hordes surged forward, racing to stake a claim.

5. By sundown, these settlers, called boomers, had staked claims on almost 2 million acres. Many Boomers discovered that some of the best lands had been grabbed by Sooners, people who had sneaked past the government officials earlier to mark their claims. Under pressure from settlers, Congress created the Oklahoma Territory in 1890. In the following years, the remainder of Indian Territory was open to settlement.

6. New Technology • -Morrill Land Grants • Gave federal land to the states to organize agricultural colleges • Led to farming innovations • -Railroad expansion • transcontinental railroad, 1869 Could transport farm equipment and farm goods between East and West

7. New Technology • Farming very difficult at first, but technology makes it easier • -deeper wells • Less chance of water in the wells evaporating • -steel plows • -better farm equipment • reaper, harvesters

8. Life on the Farm • -sod houses • blocks of prairie turf • Warm in winter, cool in summer • Small, poorly lit, haven for snakes and insects • -weather extremes • Droughts, floods, fires, blizzards, tornadoes, locust drought • No rain/very dry climate • Decline in farm production • -isolation • Miles from other settlers “I think…it took more to live twenty-four hours at a time, month in and out, on the lonely and lovely prairie, without giving up to loneliness.” ~Esther Clark Hill, Kansas

9. Sod Houses on the Frontier

10. Sod Houses on the Frontier

12. Decline of Farming • -Rise of industry • Big businesses growing and offering jobs, many move East • -Urbanization • Growth of cities pulls many back East to work in factories • -End of the frontier • Frederick Jackson Turner • “Frontier Thesis” • Claimed that frontier captured American spirit and made America unique “Now…the frontier has gone and with its going has closed the first period of American history.” ~Frederick Jackson Turner

13. Life on the Homestead • Directions: • Using the website link for Library of congress, read through a few excerpts from the Oblinger letters. • You will then write your own letter expressing your content or discontent with life on the plains. • Must include the following topics • Motivation for moving • What are the positives • What are the negative hardships • What new technology do you use to help you • Fictional events to write home about • Growth of cities pulls many back East to work in factories • -End of the frontier • Frederick Jackson Turner • “Frontier Thesis” • Claimed that frontier captured American spirit and made America unique Ideas to think about Homestead Act Morrill Land Grant Act Native Americans Steel Plow Wind mill Sod House Scare trees Railroads Locusts Bonanza Farms Wagon Trains Mechanical reaper Droughts Land Rush American Dream 160 acres liberty

14. Decline of Farming • - Great debts • Farm machinery expensive = debt • Drought and low market prices = Less money • -Railroad charges • Railroads charging Western farmers more because there is no competition “No other system of taxation has borne as heavily on the people as those extortions and inequalities of railroad charges.” ~Henry Demarest Lloyd, 1881 Atlantic Monthly