North American Studies Questions

Indian battle/massacre near Fort Phil Kearny, Dakota Territory (in present-day northern Wyoming) in 1866. A tribe of Oglala Sioux under Chief Red Cloud, provoked by the building of the Bozeman Trail through their hunting ground in southern Montana, massacred a U.S. army unit commanded by Captain W. J. Fetterman. Fetterman crossed over Lodge Trail Ridge in pursuit of the Indian attackers and he and his 80 men were killed.

In 1876, Indian leaders Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse defeated U.S. General Custer's troops who tried to force them back on to the reservation, Custer and all his men died.

Author who was upset by the injustices done to the American Indians. Her book exposed the U.S. governments many broken promises to the Native Americans. While the book created a lot of sympathy for the Indians, it also created a movement to try to assimilate them to become more civilized and give up their traditions and lifestyle.

Communities that popped up suddenly when gold or silver was discovered. overnight towns that became infamousfor saloons, dance-hall girls, and vigilante justice. Many of these, however,became lonely ghost towns within a few years after the gold or silver ran out. Examples of those that lasted are Virginia City, Sacramento, San Francisco & Denver.

A reference to the Dakota War of 1862, which resulted in the execution of 38 Dakota (Sioux) Native American men for launching an uprising in Minnesota during the Civil War. This is the largest mass execution in US history. It was also the largest act of executive clemency in US history.

Known as this before 1860, they were the lands between the Mississippi River and the Pacific Coast. The area west of the 100th meridian with few trees and less than 15 inches of rainfall a year, winter blizzards and hot dry summers.

symbolic animals of the Great Plains, often mistakenly called buffaloes. They once covered the Great Plains and much of North America, critically important to Plains Indian societies

Indian chief who attempted to lead his group of Indians to Canada to escape, they eventually surrendered and were forced to move to a reservation in Oklahoma. "I will fight no more forever" When the US govt attempted to remove them from the Oregon territory, violence broke out when Nez Perce warriors killed several white settlers without Chief Joseph's blessing

Colleges and universities created from allocations of public land through the Morrell Act of 1862 and the Hatch Act of 1887. These grants helped fuel the boom in higher education in the late nineteenth century, and many of the today's public universities derive from these grants.(Like Iowa State University)

Banned all new immigration from China. The restrictions were not fully lifted until 1965. The first large migration of Chinese to the US came after gold was discovered in California in 1848.

name given to Great Plains farmers because they had to break through so much thick soil, called sod, in order to farm; they also built their home from sod bricks.

In Colorado territory in 1864, U.S army colonel John M. Chivington led a surprise attack on a peaceful Cheyenne settlement along Sand Creek River. The Cheyenne under Chief Black Kettle tried to surrender. First waving the America Flag and then the White flag of surrender. Chivington ignored it and the U.S army killed about 200 Cheyenne during the conflict

Traveled around the U.S. and Europe and put on popular Wild West shows. The shows included re-enactments of Indian battles and displays of horsemanship and riflery. His real name was William F. Cody and he had Sitting Bull and Annie Oakley in his shows.

American historian who published the essay "The Significance of the Frontier in American History." He presented the settling of the frontier as an evolutionary process of building civilization. He argued that the spirit and success of the United States was directly tied to the country's westward expansion.

passed by Congress in 1862, this law encouraged states to use the money from the sale of federal land grants to found and maintain agricultural and technical colleges.

Encouraged westward settlement and farming on the Great Plains by offering 160 acres of public land free to any family that settled on it for 5 years. About 500,000 native born and immigrant families took advantage of this. This act helped many White settlers, but very few African Americans.

Nevada gold and silver mine discovered by Henry Comstock in 1859. It produced more than $340 million in gold and silver by 1890 and led to Nevada entering the Union in 1864. Virginia City developed from this discovery.

movement of large numbers of cattle to railroad centers and then to markets. Taken along the Chisholm, Goodnight-Loving or other trails by cowboys (vaqueros), any who were African American or Mexican and paid about a dollar a day for their dangerous work. These began to end in the 1880's when overgrazing destroyed the grass and homesteaders used barbed wire to fence off the open prairies.

True or False: Sitting Bull was murdered in an altercation sparked by the crackdown on ghost dancing.

True or False: By the 1870s, both the U.S. and Canada had enacted laws encouraging the performance of cultural or religious rituals, including dancing