1. Opening the West

2. Essential Question: Who opened the West?

3. Cultures Clash on the Prairies
1858: Discovery of Gold in Colorado
The discovery drew tens of thousands of miners to the west and led to the growth of mining camps and frontier towns
Denver
Colorado Springs
Silver Springs

4. Cultures Clash on the Prairies
1864: Sand Creek Massacre
500 peaceful Cheyenne living on the reservation at Sand Creek, Colorado, were attacked without warning by the U.S. Army; 200 were killed

5. Cultures Clash on the Prairies
1868: Treaty of Fort Laramie
The Sioux agreed to live on reservations but Sitting Bull and other leaders never signed the agreement. Lands were supposed to be protected from miners.
1874: Invasion of gold miners on Sioux’s sacred Black Hills
Within four years of the treaty miners began looking for gold in the Black Hills. The U.S. tried to buy the Black Hills from the Sioux but they refused. The U.S. ordered all Sioux to a reservation but they refused.

6. Cultures Clash on the Prairies
1876: George A. Custer’s Last Stand
Custer was sent to force the Sioux onto a reservation. He led 200 soldiers against what turned out to be 2-3,000 Native American warriors at the Battle of Little Big Horn; within twenty minutes, Custer and all his men were killed
Marks the “end” of the Indian Wars
Sioux ultimately moved onto reservations
Sitting Bull fled to Canada
Miners took over the Black Hills

7. Cultures Clash on the Prairies
1887: The policy of assimilation formalized in the Dawes Act
To formalize the policy of assimilation (“Americanization”) of Native Americans – by teaching them to want property and to farm.
“Kill the Indian, save the man”

8. Cultures Clash on the Prairies
1890: Death of Sitting Bull; Battle of Wounded Knee
The 7th Cavalry rounded up 340 starving, freezing Sioux and demanded their weapons. After one Sioux warrior fired his rifle, the soldiers used cannons to slaughter 300 of the Native Americans

9. Indian Reservations, 1890

10. Settling the Great Plains
Land grants given to railroads
Railroad companies sold frontier lands to farmers at low prices; railroad companies recruited Europeans to buy and farm frontier land
The Homestead Act and related laws pass in 1870
The Homestead Act offered 160 acres of land free to anyone who could cultivate it for five years; several thousand settlers were exodusters (African-Americans moving from the South to Kansas)
Inventions and improvements in farming technology
Increased farm productivity by decreasing the amount of effort and time required to produce farm goods (barbed wire, reaper, steel plow, steel windmill)
The Morill Land Grant Acts and Hatch Act
Supported farmers by financing agricultural education and research in farm technology and methodology

11. Hardships Faced by Frontier Farmers
Obtaining enough land, food, and shelter to support a family
Bad weather, fire, locusts, raids (Native Americans and outlaws)
Self-sufficient for clothing, medical care, farm work
Financial problems (bankruptcy, changing prices, cost of shipping and equipment)

12. Key Terms
Homesteader  settlers who moved onto free lands given by the Homestead Act
Soddy  a home built out of blocks of turf
Bonanza Farm  an enormous farm on which a single crop is grown