1. Standard 12 Notes Evaluate how westward expansion impacted the Plains Indians and fulfilled Manifest Destiny.

2. Industrialization Railroads paid for through federal grants
a. Examine the construction of the transcontinental railroad including the use of immigrant labor.
Railroads paid for through federal grants
The Federal Government granted railroad companies land
Encouraged companies to lay track across harsh land conditions west of the Mississippi River to help connect the eastern & western states
In exchange, companies had to carry goods for the federal government across country at a discount
Companies then resold the land to settlers for a profit

3. Industrialization
a. Examine the construction of the transcontinental railroad including the use of immigrant labor.
To complete the heavy work of creating the railroads, the owners relied mainly on Chinese labor.
15,000 Chinese workers were hired to help build the Central Pacific railroad
These Asian immigrants accepted lower pay than other laborers demanded.

4. Industrialization Chinese Labor continued…
The work was dangerous - many lost their lives
Many Chinese died in the explosive blasts they ignited to clear the path across the railroad companies’ land.
Many others died under rock slides & heavy snowfalls before the first transcontinental railroad was completed in 1869.
After the railroad was complete, Chinese workers were viewed as a threat to jobs in the west

5. Industrialization 1862: Pacific Railway Act
allowed Central Pacific railroad to lay track east from the Pacific Ocean and Union Pacific railroad to lay west from Omaha, Nebraska
= transcontinental railroad completed at Promontory, Utah on May 10, 1869

6. Industrialization
1879: California rewrote its constitution to include an article that forbade the hiring of workers from Asia
1869: Chinese were prohibited from becoming naturalized U.S. citizens
1882: Chinese Exclusion Act
Stalled immigration of Chinese to America
Act not abolished until 1943

7. b. Evaluate how the growth of the western population and innovations in farming and ranching impacted Plains Indians.
Westward Growth
Railroads made it easier for people to move west
(Transcontinental Railroad )
Government gave money and land grants to RRs
European settlers moved westward onto land that many Indian tribes lived & traveled on.

8. Homestead Act Homestead Act of 1862
Signed by Lincoln; opened land for white settlement west of the Mississippi River
Offered 160 acres of land free to any citizen who was head of their household
From 1862 to 1900, around 600,000 families took advantage of the deal
In 1889 a land giveaway in what is now Oklahoma attracted thousands; but many claimed the land early (or sooner) than originally intended…resulting in the nickname for the state as the “Sooner State”

9. Farming Advances  Westward Growth
Establishing a homestead was very challenging work & farming a prairie each year was even more difficult.
Technological advances were invented to make the process easier and encouraged more Americans to make the move west:
Barbed wire: to prevent animals from trampling crops & wandering off
Reaper: by speeding up harvesting, the reaper saved crops from inclement weather
Steel plow: made planting more efficient in root-filled soil
Steel windmill: in regions of unpredictable rainfall, the windmill prevented crop dehydration by bringing up underground water for irrigation

10. Conflict with Plains Indians
Indian tribes were nomadic (move from place to place) because they followed herds of buffalo.
Buffalo was important to life because they provided: meat for food, hides for shelter & clothing, and bone for tools.
Settlers destroy buffalo population
From 15 million in 1865 to 600 in 1886
Because they saw their lifestyle and survival threatened, armed conflicts began.
Herds of buffalo provided: meat for food, hides for shelter & clothing, and bone for tools.

14. c. Explain the Plains Indians’ resistance to western expansion of the United States and the consequences of their resistance.

15. Natives relationship with the U.S. Treaty of Fort Laramie
Conflict is over LAND: Indians need for hunting and settlers want it for farming and mining
The government had set up reservations west of the Mississippi River as a way to contain Native American groups & open up areas for settlement.
Treaty of Fort Laramie (1868) was between the government & the Sioux Nation.
Prohibited European settlers, roads, and railroads from moving onto large tract of land that included the Black Hills in present-day South Dakota.

16. Little Bighorn / Wounded Knee
Six years later (1874) after the treaty, miners discovered gold in the Black Hills – when they went there, they wanted government protection from the Indians.
June 25, 1876, Sitting Bull (a Sioux leader) and his followers attacked and defeated General George Custer at Little Bighorn, killing Custer & his men.
Years of armed conflict followed, ending with U.S. soldiers capturing and killing more than 300 unarmed Natives at Wounded Knee Creek in 1890.
This ended the Indian resistance.

17. Dawes Act / Indian Reorganization Act
Passed by Congress in 1887, the Dawes Act broke up reservation land into farming parcels of 160 acres each for Native American families.
Native Americans were encouraged to abandon their culture & live like settlers of European descent  children were sent to schools far away from home.
Dawes Act was a FAILURE  Indian Reorganization Act was passed to reverse the Dawes Act, giving Natives more control over their land.

18. Practice Questions A. an improved economy B. loss of native lands
What effect did the discovery of gold in the Black Hills have on the Sioux?
A. an improved economy
B. loss of native lands
C. less government intervention
D. expansion of the reservation system