Settling the West US History. What is the West? Why is it important? Frederick Jackson Turner, 1893:...

Settling the West

US History

What is the West?

Why is it important?

Frederick Jackson Turner, 1893:

• In the US the West gave rise to• inventiveness• independence• unique American customs• It’s the “national safety valve”• …the place to go to start over.

Great Plains, Rockies, Pacific Coast

1890 - “The West is closed.”

• US Census Bureau reported:– The West is so

thoroughly settled “that there can hardly be said to be a frontier line.”

– Still, huge tracts of land were available.

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Miners and Ranchers





Mining Industry Explodes• West was rich in mineral

resources: gold, silver, copper, lead, zinc.

• Individual miners used “placer mining”:– Picks, shovels, and pans for

shallow deposits.

• Later on, mining companies used “quartz mining”:– Big machinery for digging

deeper.



Big Strike in Nevada: From Boom to Ghost Town

• 1859 Henry Comstock staked a claim in Six-Mile Canyon, Nevada for silver.– Almost overnight, 30,000 miners

appeared in Virginia City, NV– New town had several newspapers,

a six-story hotel, an opera house, and latest fashion from Europe.

• But in a few years, the silver was exhausted.– The town collapsed and became a

ghost town.



Ranching and Cattle Drives• Cattle ranching became profitable

during the Civil War. Why? – Demand from Union and Confed

armies drove up the price.– Railroads made bringing Western

cattle to Eastern markets easy and practical.

– Longhorn cattle were now bred to withstand harsh conditions (little water; rough grass)


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Ranching and Cattle Drives• Long Drives:

– Purpose: get the cattle to Eastern markets

– Spring roundup by cowboys from open range.

– Cowboys moved herds to railheads over hundreds of miles.

– First long cattle drive: 1866, ranchers drove 260,000 head to Western end of RR at Sedalia, MS.



Ranching: Big Business• Farmers started using a new

invention, barbed wire.– Marks their field boundaries;

keeps cattle out.

• Ranchers fought with farmers over open range.– Violence broke out over cutting

wire.

• Years later, ranchers used barbed wire, too, to keep rival herds out of THEIR pastures.



End of Ranching: Growth of Railroads

• As more and more railroads were built closer to cattle ranches, long drives became less and less necessary.

• Oversupply of cattle led to drop in prices.

• Blizzard of 1886-87 killed thousands of cattle and drove ranchers out of business.– Cowboys became ranch hands.



Great Plains

• Extends to Rocky Mountains.

• Less than 20 in of rainfall.

• Home to enormous herds of Buffalo hunted by Native Americans for hides and meat.



Settlement• Railroads opened the Great

Plains.– Congress gave huge land

grants to railroads.– Railroads sold the land to

settlers.

• 1862 Congress passed Homestead Act: – For $10 registration, 160 acres

of land free to any citizen who was household head.

– 1862-1890 600,000 people took up Homestead Act.



Dry Farming• Planting seeds deep in

ground to get available moisture in earth.

• Wealthy large-scale farmers used new inventions:– Balers, binders,

threshing machines– Most “sodbusters” didn’t

have these.

• Great Plains became the “Wheat Belt”


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Hard Times

• By 1880s US was leading exporter of wheat.– But surplus on the market

led to drop in prices.– Many farmers took out

mortgages on their farms to get loans through the hard times.

– If you couldn’t make payment, you lost your farm.

– By late 1880s, drought made farming even harder.



Last Hurrah!

• April 1889 government opened one of the last large tracts of unsettled land: Indian Territory.– Within hours, more than

10,000 people raced into the territory in the Oklahoma Land Rush.



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