Chapter 8

 Precious Metals (Gold and Silver)  Indian Wars  Impact of the Railroads  Availability of Cheap Land  The Cattle Industry  Farming Industry

1. Discovery of gold, silver and copper attracted settlers to move west and strike it rich.  Placer Mining- shallow mining with simple tools  Quartz Mining- corporate mining, digging deeper 2. Comstock Lode - Henry Comstock staked a claim in Six-Mile Canyon, Nevada. His discovery of a sticky blue gray mud turned out to be pure silver ore. This brought hordes of miners to Virginia City, Nevada. Over night a boomtown was born!

4. “Wild Wild West”- Mining towns turned into gathering places for criminals. Vigilance committees formed to punish wrong doers.  Boom and Bust Cycle:  Boom: Town is discovered to have precious metals. People flock to cities to mine.  Bust: Precious metals are depleted. People leave. Town becomes ghost town

 Denver- main supply point for mining areas in Colorado (Rocky Mtns)  Became 2 nd largest city behind San Francisco  Klondike Gold Rush- ( ) struck gold in Northern Canada and Alaska.  100,000 prospector stampede in search of gold. Terrible terrain & conditions. ALASKA!

5. Growth of cattle and sheep ranching attracted settlers to The Great Plains. The Texas longhorn emerged as profitable cattle on the open range. 6. Two developments that made it practical and profitable for ranchers to move cattle:  The Civil War- most of the beef was slaughtered to feed the armies.  The construction of the Railroad.

Long Cattle Drives became a popular way to get cattle to the Railroad lines for shipment to the east. Popular Cattle Trails started in Texas and went north to Kansas and Missouri.

What do you notice about the location of the trails and where do they lead to? Why do the trails end where they do?

The Chisholm Trail

 Range wars- cattle drives moving cattle vs. farmers settling  What is barbed wire to you?

Barbed Wire Joseph Glidden Meant to close off private lands The Reaper Cyrus McCormick Made it easier to harvest crops Steel Plow John Deere Easier to plow land

1. Cheap land of the Homestead Act encouraged settlement. A homesteader could claim up to 160 acres of public land and could receive title to that land after living there for five years. 2. New farming methods and inventions turned the Great Plains into the “Wheat Belt”. Families could now farm large pieces of land called Bonanza Farms.

3. Railroads brought scarce supplies like lumber and brick to the Great Plains. It sent back meat and wheat 4. To promote agriculture and farming, the 1862 Morrill Act gave states large tracts of federal lands, with the requirement that part of the land be used to set up and maintain colleges.  In 1890 the Census Bureau reported “that there can hardly be said to be a frontier line.”  What does this quote mean?

 Federal land to finance agricultural colleges.  To support farmers.  Research led to innovations.  Breadbasket of the nation.

1. For centuries the Native Americans roamed the Great Plains as nomads, following their main source of food- the buffalo. 2. White settlers forced Native Americans to relocate to new territory by moving onto their land and depriving them of their hunting grounds.

3. By the 1870’s many Native Americans on the southern Plains had left the reservations in disgust after many uprisings against the white settlers. 4. By 1889, the army promoted wasteful buffalo slaughter to help force Native Americans onto reservations.

Read Page 301 (Battle of Little Bighorn)

5. Battle of Little Bighorn- On June 25, 1876, the Lakota Sioux killed General George Custer and all 210 of his troops in one of the most famous battles in U.S. military history. In newspapers Custer and his men were portrayed as victims. 6. Massacre at Wounded Knee- On December 29, 1890, 300 Lakota men, women and children were massacred for defying orders of the government and continuing to perform the Ghost Dance.

Sitting Bull

7. Many Americans felt the only way to improve relations with Native Americans would be for them assimilate, or be absorbed, into American society as landowners and citizens. This practice became law in 1887 when Congress passed the Dawes Act. 8. In the end, assimilation failed and there was no satisfactory solution to the Native American issue. Buffalo herds were wiped out and Native Americans on the Plains had no way to sustain their way of life.