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Review Of Red Earth: Race And Agriculture In Oklahoma Territory

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In Red Earth: Race and Agriculture in Oklahoma Territory, Bonnie Lynn-Sherow gives an in-depth agricultural and racial account of the Oklahoma Territory settlement focusing on African Americans, white settlers, and Native Americans after the land rush. Throughout the book, Lynn-Sherow depicts the Oklahoma Territory from the first Oklahoma land rush in 1889 to the year before it became a state, 1906. Lynn-Sherow puts emphasis on three specific counties in Oklahoma Territory that are identified with each of the three groups of people previously mentioned. The counties include Logan County, Blaine County, and Caddo County. The sources used throughout Red Earth, which include oral accounts, aid in her explanation by explaining how different life …show more content…

She explained that many African Americans decided to partake in the Rush because they saw this as a wonderful opportunity to get away from the horrible past they had lived and a way to own their own land. Red Earth gives great insight as to how the African Americans utilized their land they came to own. Many of them took part in subsistence farming as well as market farming finding success by keeping their farms diversified. Lynn-Sherow talks about Robert Slaughter and how he successfully maintained his farm through subsistence and market farming by growing wheat, corn, and cotton as well as fruit trees like peach, cherry, and …show more content…

In Red Earth, it is explained that the white settlers stole horses from the Kiowas and the Kiowas expected the whites to be punished. Lynn-Sherow gives an account of how the white settlers and Kiowa Indians were not treated equally but one better than the other. General Sheridan told the Indians that when white people commit crimes they are punished, so if the Indians commit crimes they will also be punished. That did not occur as it should have when an Indian came up to Sheridan and explained that there was a group of Utes, Osages, and some others that killed some of his warriors; Sheridan responded saying that he did not have anything to say about that matter. Lynn-Sherow also mentions that whites would dress up like Indians and steal from other whites and Mexicans so the blame can be placed on the neighboring

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