Vocabulary
Dodge City, KS
Kansas City, MO
Wichita, KS
What are some examples of cowtowns?
The American belief that the U.S. was supposed to extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean.
What was Manifest Destiny?
The kind of houses settlers built.
What were sod houses?
A Native American chief who tricked Captain William Fetterman.
Who was Crazy Horse?
When people rapidly leave a mining town all at once.
What is going bust?
A government program that allowed people to file for a homestead and buy land for really cheap.
What was the Homestead Act?
This made routes that once took months to travel take days.
What was the railroad system?
Cities that sprung up rapidly after gold was found there.
He led the Dakota Uprising.
Who was Chief Little Crow?
Using pressurized water to wash away mountainsides and reveal minerals.
What is hydraulic mining?
Crops were destroyed and dirt was turned to dust.
What did the major drought in late 1880s cause?
A common pastime for men after work.
What was gambling?
A popular boomtown where gold was found.
What was Virginia City?
He discovered a massive silver deposit in Nevada, but sold it because he couldn’t find any gold and didn’t know it was silver.
Who was Henry Comstock?
Huge farms that brought in lots of profits for their owners.
What are bonanza farms?
The Dakota people killed hundreds of settlers after not getting paid by the government like they were promised.
What was the Dakota Sioux uprising?
Self-appointed volunteers who acted as law enforcement in boomtowns.
What were vigilance committees?
Where the Sand Creek Massacre took place.
What was Sand Creek?
He believed the Great Plains were nearly impossible to settle.
Who was Stephen Long?
A nickname for farmers that used a new method of farming to grow wheat in the dry environment.
What are sodbusters?
Huge amounts of cattle were killed from this event.
Western Trail and Shawnee Trail
What were some cattle trails?
Land owned by the government where cattle roamed freely.
What were open ranges?
They trained American cowboys.
What were Mexican vaqueros?