Growing Toward Statehood Colorado Territory

Over View  Homestead act  Homesteading  Farming the Plains  Soddies  Families  Communication  The Railroads  Denver Pacific  Working on the Railroads  Race to Cheyenne  Changes  Statehood  State capital

Homestead Act  One year after Colorado became a territory  The Homestead act was issued  Homestead Act  160 acres for married people  80 acres for single people  Men or women were allowed to try for land  Have to be a legal citizen  Once on the land homesteaders had five years to “prove up”

Homesteading  A great chance to start over  At first people did not come to Colorado instead they went to Nebraska and Kansas and Oklahoma. The soil in these states were good for farming  Colorado was still known as Great American Desert  When the best land was taken people decided to give Colorado a chance  Plowing dry ground is slow work  Preparing the land for crops was only part of the work that was done in order to survive in CO

Farming the Plains  Two different ways  Irrigated ( watered) their crops  Dams and gates in the ditches made it possible for farmers to control the flow of water  Dry Faming  Planted crops that needed very little water to grow  Planted plants at different times  In time  Corn, wheat, beans, barley, hay and alfalfa grew across the plains  Melons ripened along the Arkansas  Greeley and Longmont began as farming communities  Other towns were supply towns to these communities

“Soddies”  House made of block of dirt  The blocks had grass sod on top  Placed the blocks in rows, stacked the blocks on top of each other  Sometimes if people had the money they would cover the inside walls with a plaster glue to keep them clean and dry  When tall enough using small amounts of wood roofs were put into place and were covered with more sod

Hard Fact!  Two oxen could plow an acre of land in one day  An acre is 43,560 sq. feet  ¾ of a football field  Remember they were given 160 acres!!!

Families  Everyone helped!  Women/Mother  cooked meals, sewed clothes and worked in the garden and in the fields if needed  Kids  carried water from the well or stream, cared for animals chickens, milk cows, pigs, goats and horses  They helped in the field and in the gardens too  Men/Father  Built the houses, barns and other structures, planted and plowed the fields

Communication  A year after the Homestead Act ( about 1863)  The telegraph grew in popularity  Dot- Dash System  Was the fastest way to communicate with others  This invention would make the Pony Express obsolete

Railroads!  It took wagons a long time to bring in new supply and it was really expensive  RR had not yet reached Colorado because of the Rockies  There was no clear path through that explorers had found  So when the 1 st transcontinental RR was going in they avoid the Rockies by going through Wyoming

Working on the railroads  Immigrants were the main labor source to build the RRs  The Irish and Civil War Vets were most on the eastern side of the Rockies  Chinese and others were mostly on the west side of the Rockies  Back breaking work  Extremely dangerous especially up in the mountains  Weather and explosions

Denver Pacific Railway  When the RR went through Cheyenne WY business began to move there too.  People in Denver didn’t want to lose out and began to worry about being to far away from the RR  They wanted the goods and services that were in Cheyenne to come to Denver  A group of people began to fundraise and would later create a rail line from Denver to Cheyenne  It was called  The Denver Pacific Railway!

The Race to Cheyenne  Two companies were competing for the railroad line to Cheyenne  Colorado Central Railroad from Golden  Denver Pacific From Denver  After two years of battling out  Denver Pacific Railway arrived in Cheyenne First  The Colorado Territory was officially Connected to the rest of the USA

Railroads bring change  The Territory quickly changed after the RR arrived  The RR brought tons of people to the area  Miner  Merchants  Proprietors  Women  Tourists  They came to see the sights ( just like they do today!)  Hotels and lodges provided jobs for people  People worked as manager, clerks, maids, cooks, waiters and guides

Statehood  1 st step have enough people  The gold rush, the silver rush and the RR brought in enough people  2 nd Step a State Constitution  It took several years to write it  People have to vote to approve it  August 1 st 1876 Colorado becomes the 38 th State to join the union  It happened 100 years after the US had become a Nation  Nickname for our State= Centennial State