Manifest Destiny

1. Manifest Destiny manifest: clear or obvious destiny: future or fate

2. John Gast, American Progress, 1872

3. Map of the United States, 1872

4. Contemporary Map of the 1816 United States

5. John Melish, Map of the U.S. with the contiguous British and Spanish Possessions,1816

6. Melish’s comments on his 1816 map of the United States To present the country this way was desirable . . . The map shows at a glance the whole extent of the United States territory from sea to sea. In tracing the probable expansion of the human race from east to west, the mind finds an agreeable resting place on its western limits. The view is complete and leaves nothing to be wished for. It also adds to the beauty and symmetry of the map. Source: John Melish. Map of the United States with the contiguous British and Spanish Possessions. Philadelphia, 1816.

7. Lewis and Clark – Beaver $$$$$ • Fashion of the day – Beaver felt hats! Pelts 1.5 to 3 pounds; • Quality of pelt $3 to $6 a pound • Average pelt - $10 = $120 to $150 TODAY • Best quality late winter, early spring, and then stretch and dry late spring and trade in the summer when you could get to market in St. Louis

8. Mountain Men and Fur Traders and Companies • Hudson Bay: 1670 to present day, scorch stream policy, Flathead Post, Fort Boise • Northwest Co.: Fort Vancouver, Oregon Country 1790 bought by Hudson Bay • Missouri Fur Co: Manuel Lisa owner 1807 (John Colter) • Free trapper – independent, dangerous, sold to anyone; • Company Trappers – sold only to company

9. Manifest Destiny – get your people on the land and take it! • American Fur Co.: John Jacob Astor – Astorians, Fort Astoria, 3 point Trade between Asia, Europe, USA - Tonquin sank War of 1812 • Ashleyand Henry Co: 1822, Most Americans Rendezvous system!: Jed Smith (South Pass – published 1824 a wagon route across the Continental Divide) fixed maps, found trails; Jim Beckworth, Joe Walker, Jim Bridger, Hugh Glass, Kit Carson

10. Ashley and Henry’s Men • Jed Smith – trail blazer, traveled length and breadth of Utah and West – first to cross Mojave and Great Basin looking for Mierra’s mythical rivers • Hugh Glass – story of remarkable will to live after grizzly attack • James Beckworth – VA slave who found pass through Sierra Nevada Mntns to get wagons into California – Crow chief

11. Rendezvous – keep men in the mountains! St Louis price compared to Mountain price • Alcohol – 15 cents gallon vs $5 a pint • Coffee – 15 cents pound vs $2 pound • Cloth 14 cents yard vs $10 yard • Flour 2 cents a pound vs $2 • Lead – 6 cents a pound vs $2 • Gunpowder – 7 cents a pound vs $2 • Paid with beaver pelts which were bought for $2 to $4 per pelt not by the pound!

12. 1840 – silk hat replaced fashion • Fur Companies ended – Hudson Bay Company only remained • Mountain Men – returned to civilization or became guides for military or home seekers bound for Oregon or California • Trails West - Oregon, California, Santa Fe, Mormon, Old Spanish Trail

13. Oregon Trail - 1836 • Narcissus Whitman and Eliza Spalding are the first white women travel overland to Oregon. – Set up a mission to the Cayuse along the Snake and Columbia confluence, attacked by Indians after a measles outbreak in 1847 – Sager Children there!

14. Emigrants • Leave in May, don’t stall, travel light, disease and accidents kill! • Prairie library and Roadside telegraphs • Let’s take Oregon and not share it – “54-40 or Fight” – James K. Polk was one of Andrew Jackson’s favorites who got elected on a manifest destiny platform – willing to go to war over land

15. Get your people on the land with the hope of gaining land or $. • Fur trade • Land in Oregon and California • Land in Texas and slaves to grow cotton • Gold and silver strikes • Homesteads! • Just kick the Native Americans off the land