Boom Towns

After the California Gold Rush, miners began looking for gold in other parts of the West. In 1858 gold was found at Pikes Peak in the Colorado Rockies. The discovery brought about 50,000 prospectors to the gold fields of Colorado. Prospectors found some gold in the streams and land, but most of the gold was deep in the rocks. Mining companies with machinery and many workers had a much better chance of finding large amounts of gold than individual miners did. In 1859 several prospectors found one of the world’s richest deposits of silver ore in Nevada. The find was called the Comstock Lode. Thousands of silver mines opened in the area, but few were successful. Gold and silver strikes created boomtowns. Within two years it changed from a mining camp to a town with banks, hotels, newspapers, and opera.People became rich quickly, but they also lost their wealth quickly in the boomtowns. Food, shelter, clothing, and other products were very expensive. Violence, cheating, and stealing were common in boomtowns. These were towns that developed around the mining sites. Money was earned quickly but was often lost by gambling and spending. Few boomtowns had police or prisons, so violence and crime were common. Sometimes regular people acted to punish criminals. They were known as vigilantes.

Most of the people who lived in boomtowns were men. But some women also moved to the towns. They opened businesses, schools, and churches, and worked by cooking, doing laundry, and other jobs. Boomtowns usually lasted only until all the ore was mined. Then people left, creating ghost towns. As the quantities of gold and silver decreased, miners began looking for other metals, like copper, lead, and zinc. People moved to areas that had these metals. The growing populations led to the creation of new states in the West.

Ghost TownsWhen the ore had been mined out of a location, people left the towns. Boomtowns became ghost towns as people left to find better mining opportunities. After the gold and silver had been mined, lower metals were found to also bring profit. Copper, zinc, and lead could be mined and sold as raw materials. Many people stayed in the West, and the frontier territories became states. Colorado joined the Union in 1876. North Dakota, South Dakota, Washington, and Montana were added in 1889. Wyoming and Idaho became states in 1890.When the gold and silver production would fail and the miners would move on. The merchants would be quick to follow, and close their stores too. The town would be abandoned and quickly turn from Boomtown to Ghost Town.

Homestead ActFarming on the Great Plains seemed impossible to the first settlers. It was too dry and open. The railroads made western travel easier and cheaper, and free land was being offered. There was a year of good rain that attracted settlers to farming. In 1862 Congress passed the Homestead Act. This Act gave 160 acres of land to anyone who would settle and live on the land for five years. Thousands traveled west to homestead, earn ownership of land by settling on it. Immigrants and unmarried women were part of the crowd that headed west. Married women were not eligible to file for land. However, widowed or single women had the same rights as men. Women were 12 percent of the homesteaders in Colorado and Wyoming. Railroad companies wanted to sell some of their government land to raise more money. Steamships advertised for the railroad companies in Scandinavia. Thousands of Swedes and Norwegians traveled to Minnesota and the Dakotas to settle. The Scandinavian influence remains in those areas today. African Americans traveled west after Reconstruction. Because they no longer received federal protection in the South, many sought a better life by homesteading.

Farming on the Great Plains was extremely difficult. Some years there was no rain and crops died. Some years there was too much rain and crops died. Brushfires would cross the Plains in dry seasons. Summer could also bring grasshoppers. A swarm of grasshoppers would leave nothing left of a crop. Winters were the most challenging. The winds were fierce. The snow could bury animals and trap people. The men worked hard in the fields. The women worked in the field and cared for the children. Farm wives would sew clothes, make candles, preserve food, and cook meals. They took over all farm duties when the farmers were away to sell the harvest or buy supplies. The children worked the farm as soon as they were old enough. Most missed school to help on the farm. The farmers on the Plains became known as sodbusters. They had to invent new methods of farming the dry soil. One way was dry farming, planting the seed deep in the ground where there was some moisture. The farmers used windmills to pump water from deep in the ground. Dry farming was not very successful. Many farmers went into debt. Some lost their farms.Oklahoma was the last part of the Plains to be opened for homesteaders.

Oklahoma had been “Indian Territory” for over 50 years. Homesteaders were to line up one day in 1889 at the edge of Oklahoma. At the sound of the bugle, the homesteaders, or boomers, could cross the border and choose their claim. They discovered that other settlers, or sooners, had already settled on the best land. The frontier was officially declared closed after the 1890 census. Settlements covered the nation.

Transcontinental Railroad

Transportation was critical for the mining communities. They needed to get their raw materials to factories, ports, and markets to sell. They also needed food and supplies. The demand was too great for wagon trains and stagecoaches. Railroads became the answer. Large subsidies(loans) from the government paid for the railroad. A subsidy is financial aid and land grants from the government. Railroad companies said it was the responsibility of the government to support the railroad because it benefited the entire country. The federal government agreed and gave the railroad company more than 130 million acres. Much of the land was obtained from the Native Americans. The strips of land were 20 to 80 miles wide. The railroad company could then sell some of the land to pay for construction costs. States and towns also contributed money to the railroads. The contributions ensured that the railroad would come through their town.

A transcontinental rail line, one that spans the continent from coast to coast, became a necessity. During the Civil War, a northern route was chosen. The challenge was to lay track over 1,700 miles. The tracks would be over the hot plains and through the mountains. Two companies took the job. The more track a company laid, the more government assistance it received. One company hired mostly Chinese workers. The other company hired Irish and African American workers. All employees worked under harsh conditions for little money. The transcontinental railroad was finished in 1869. The governor of California drove the last golden spike to join the two parts of the railroad.

Two more transcontinental railroads and smaller lines were added later. They connected the cities in the West with the rest of the country. Workers came west to work on railroads. Trains transported metals, goods, and people back and forth. More tracks were laid. The need for steel, coal, and construction increased. These industries grew as the railroad grew. Towns along the railroad expanded into large cities.

The railroads also affected how time was measured. Clocks between two cities like New York and Boston were 11 minutes apart. The railroad needed consistent times to maintain a schedule and developed the time zones across the country. The country was divided into four sections. Each zone would be one hour before or after the surrounding zones. Congress accepted this practice and made it law in 1918.

Native American Struggles

Every group that settled in the West made it more difficult for the Native Americans. The Sioux lived in the northern Plains. Like other Plains Indians, they had a nomadic (roaming) lifestyle. They settled in one place for only part of the year. Most of the year was spent following the buffalo across the open Plains. The buffalo was critical in the life of the Sioux. Buffalo skins were used for teepees, clothing, and bags. The bones were made into hoes, knives, and fishhooks. The meat of the buffalo was dried and eaten all winter. Even the manure was used for fuel. The Sioux traded buffalo and beaver skins for supplies and food that the buffalo did not provide. Extended families lived and hunted together. The women raised the children to follow the Sioux traditions.

Before the Civil War, the Native Americans on the Plains had millions of buffalo to maintain their way of life. Later, buffalo was used to feed the crews working on the railroad. The railroad wanted to prevent the buffalo from blocking the trains. Kansas Pacific Railroad hired William Cody to kill thousands of buffalo in less than two years. He was then known as Buffalo Bill. Buffalo were killed for sport and for their hides. Within three years more than nine million buffalo were killed for their hides. The hides were sold back East. The rest of the animal was left on the Plains to rot.

The Indian Peace Commission was started in 1867. It recommended that the Native Americans be moved to reservations. Reservations are tracts of land set aside for Native Americans. The “Indian Territory” had already been established in Oklahoma. Another reservation was set in the Dakota Territory for the Sioux. Land that the white settlers did not want became land for the reservations. The government had promised supplies and goods for the Native Americans. Many times, the supplies never arrived or were of poor quality. Many Native Americans accepted the move to the reservations. Some, however, strongly opposed the move. The Cheyenne and the Sioux were two groups who fought the relocation.

Wounded Knee

The good intentions of reformers led to the downfall of the Native American culture. Helen Hunt Jackson and other reformers were shocked by the killing and harsh conditions of the Native Americans. The Dawes Act of 1887 aimed to improve the lives of Native Americans. It served instead to divide the culture. The Dawes Act gave each individual Native American a plot of land within the reservation. The land was no longer for the whole group. The idea was for the Native Americans to become farmers and citizens of the United States. The children were sent to white schools. The land was sold to support their schooling. The best land was sold. Many Native Americans could not farm the land on which they lived. As their culture weakened, the Native American sought a prophet, Wovoka. He said that the Sioux could regain their strength if they performed the Ghost Dance. The government officials of the territory viewed the Ghost Dance as a threat. The dance would no longer be allowed.

The government blamed the Sioux chief, Sitting Bull, for his people’s difficult adjustment to reservation life. In their attempts to arrest him, they killed Sitting Bull. In response to his death, hundreds of Lakota Sioux met at a creek called Wounded Knee in South Dakota. The Sioux were dying of cold and hunger when the army came to collect their weapons. A single shot was fired accidentally. The army’s response was to fire with machine guns, killing more than 300 Lakota. The battle at Wounded Knee was the last armed battle between the United States and the Native Americans.

Little Big Horn

The Battle of the Little Bighorn, fought on June 25, 1876, near the Little Bighorn River in Montana Territory, pitted federal troops led by Lieutenant Colonel George Armstrong Custer (1839-76) against a band of Lakota Sioux and Cheyenne warriors. Tensions between the two groups had been rising since the discovery of gold on Native American lands. When a number of tribes missed a federal deadline to move to reservations, the U.S. Army, including Custer and his 7th Calvary, was dispatched to confront them. Custer was unaware of the number of Indians fighting under the command of Sitting Bull (c.1831-90) at Little Bighorn, and his forces were outnumbered and quickly overwhelmed in what became known as Custer’s Last Stand.

Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse (c.1840-77), leaders of the Sioux on the Great Plains, strongly resisted the mid-19th-century efforts of the U.S. government to confine their people to reservations. In 1875, after gold was discovered in South Dakota’s Black Hills, the U.S. Army ignored previous treaty agreements and invaded the region. This betrayal led many Sioux and Cheyenne tribesmen to leave their reservations and join Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse in Montana. By the late spring of 1876, more than 10,000 Native Americans had gathered in a camp along the Little Bighorn River–which they called the Greasy Grass–in defiance of a U.S. War Department order to return to their reservations or risk being attacked.

In mid-June, three columns of U.S. soldiers lined up against the camp and prepared to march. A force of 1,200 Native Americans turned back the first column on June 17. Five days later, General Alfred Terry ordered George Custer’s 7th Cavalry to scout ahead for enemy troops. On the morning of June 25, Custer drew near the camp and decided to press on ahead rather than wait for reinforcements.

At mid-day on June 25, Custer’s 600 men entered the Little Bighorn Valley. Among the Native Americans, word quickly spread of the impending attack. The older Sitting Bull rallied the warriors and saw to the safety of the women and children, while Crazy Horse set off with a large force to meet the attackers head on. Despite Custer’s desperate attempts to regroup his men, they were quickly overwhelmed. Custer and some 200 men in his battalion were attacked by as many as 3,000 Native Americans; within an hour, Custer and all of his soldiers were dead.

The Battle of the Little Bighorn, also called Custer’s Last Stand, marked the most decisive Native American victory and the worst U.S. Army defeat in the long Plains Indian War. The demise of Custer and his men outraged many white Americans and confirmed their image of the Indians as wild and bloodthirsty. Meanwhile, the U.S. government increased its efforts to subdue the tribes. Within five years, almost all of the Sioux and Cheyenne would be confined to reservations.