Geography Chapter Summary

People could obtain land by applying with the Homestead Act after farming the land for five years. Water rights allowed all farmers to get water for crops and consumption. These water rights helped people work the prairie and farm.

Transporting the cattle created the opportunity to further build the economy. Many business were created and citizens benefited highly from the jobs created from building of the railroad systems, which employed thousands of

What- The demand for gold became increasingly higher and higher during this time. Because of this Americans kept on moving farther and farther west into areas where Indians lived in search of gold. The government started setting up Indian reservations to avoid conflict. The Sioux and the Cheyenne missed their deadline to move to a reservation so Custer came to

The gold rush played a major part in the westward expansion. The gold rush is where millions of people came from all over the world. The gold rush started in 1848 and ended in 1852.

These railroads were beneficial to the settlement of the Great Plains and transportation. The railroads led tracks into the Great Plains and provided

The westward expansion map is one that has great historical significance as it illustrates the state of the then growing American West due to widespread migration between the years 1860 and 1890. It explores several ways in which the United States experienced a burgeoning of the population all through the latter decades of the 19th century. The map depicts population centers, railroad networks, major cities and improved agricultural lands across the two-decades encoded on the map. Also, the map clearly shows the boundaries of the states and outlying territories, the native tribes of the west, geological features, and precipitation information. This paper will focus on analyzing the factors mentioned above in the westward in the years 1860,

The Homestead Act encouraged large-scale settlement of the western United States during the late 1800s considering this law declared settlers could easily obtain up to one hundred and sixty acres of land without payment if these people merely lived on it for five years, developed it, and paid a small free of approximately thirty dollars.

Railroads had the most impact on the nineteenth century. It was viewed to be one of the most important inventions. Railroads allowed for economic growth, and effectively added to the transportation network. They served as a link between far away cities allowing people to come together, purchase outside goods, have greater independence and promote economic specialization. Railroads would later have the ability to produce items in large

The Act focused on “civilizing power.” At this time, settlers argued that Indians had more land and that reservations were too big and being used “inefficiently.” The Act allotted Indian lands to individual Native Americans, splitting up tribes. According to the notes, “The new policy focused specifically on breaking up reservations by granting land allotment to Individual Native Americans.” Those who accepted allotments could become United States citizens.

“Gold! Gold! Gold from the American River!” yelled Samuel Brannan running through the streets, starting the entire famous Gold Rush (according to shmoop.com). You are about to know about a lot more things in the westward than you knew before, because this essay is going to tell you lots of things that happened during the westward expansion. Things like what type of things people did or needed when they shopped (or bartered), the gold rush, the (free) homestead act (which by the way was eventually passed), and about how fur trappers lay (or make) down the Oregon Trail.

America’s westward expansion really affected the lives of the Native Americans in several ways. Since Americans were wanting land for farming, ranching, and mining, it took away the Native Americans land for hunting and gathering. In general, this dramatically changed the face of American history.

As the population of the West soared and the prospects of statehood for western territories appeared clearer and clearer, the nation battled over the future of slavery in the West. This battle was one reason for the Civil War, which slowed the acceleration of expansion. However, the last three decades of the nineteenth century saw the return of accelerating expansion due to the successful struggle to contain the Plains Indians in reservations, and the completion of the transcontinental railroad in 1869. By the

First, the building of railroads out west played a huge part in the successful expansion of our country and the fulfillment of American dreams. Priot to the development of a more efficient railroad system, the movement of people and freight were

The Westward Expansion has often been regarded as the central theme of American history, down to the end of the19th century and as the main factor in the shaping of American history. As Frederick Jackson Turner says, the greatest force or influence in shaping American democracy and society had been that there was so much free land in America and this profoundly affected American society. Motives After the revolution, the winning of independence opened up the Western country and was hence followed by a steady flow of settlers to the Mississippi valley. By 1840, 10 new western states had been added to the Federal union. The frontier line ran through Iowa, Missouri and Arkansas on the western side

Westward expansion was a time of successes and failures, a time celebrations and grief, a time full of life and death but in the end it shaped how America is the way is today. Westward expansion was put in action because of the belief of Manifest Destiny, the belief that it is America fate to expand from the Atlantic to Pacific ocean. The economical, political and humanitarians impacts were necessary to achieve the goal of manifest Destiny and Westward Expansion.