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Westward Expansion
Important vocabulary for Westward Expansion unit.
| Term | Definition |
|---|---|
| agriculture | raising plants and animals for food |
| Battle of Little Big Horn | Native American victory over United States soldiers, led to the United States becoming tougher on Native Americans aka Custer's Last Stand |
| boomtowns | towns in the U.S. in the late 1800s that grew up "overnight" when gold was discovered there |
| buffalo | large shaggy-haired brown bison of North American plains |
| cattle drive | A way cowboys moved large herds of cattle from ranches in Texas north to towns along the railroads in the late 1800s. |
| climate | weather over time |
| coolie | name for a Chinese immigrant working on the Transcontinental Railroad |
| environment | the external surroundings in which a plant, animal, or human lives, which tend to influence its development and behavior |
| exodusters | African-American pioneers who fled the South to farm on the Great Plains. |
| Dawes Act | A federal law intended to turn Native Americans into farmers and landowners by providing cooperating families with 160 acres of reservation land for farming or 320 acres for grazing. |
| frontier | an unexplored area |
| Gold Rush | sudden movement of many people to an area where gold has been found |
| immigrant | a person who comes to a country to live permanently |
| policy | an officially accepted set of rules or ideas about what should be done |
| Pony Express | Service begun in 1860 that used a relay of riders on horses to deliver mail from Missouri to California in ten days. |
| ranch | A large farm, especially in the western United States, on which large herds of cattle, sheep, or horses are raised. |
| range wars | fights between farmers and ranchers over land |
| reservations | Land set aside by the government for Native Americans - they were forced to move there. |
| Russian Wheat | wheat brought by Russian immigrants that thrived in the harsh climate of the Great Plains. |
| sodbusters | nickname for Great Plains farmers because they had to cut through sod to reach the fertile ground underneath. |
| soddy | house made out of sod on the Great Plains because their was a scarcity of lumber and stone |
| subsidy | money that is usually paid by a government to keep the price of a product or service low or to help a business or organization to continue to function |
| scarcity | when the amount of something is not enough to meet the demand |
| surplus | the amount that remains when need is satisfied (having more than you need) |
| technology | use of new ideas to make tools that improve people's lives |
| Transcontinental Railroad | a railroad built to connect the East Coast to the West Coast |
| Wounded Knee | Last major conflict between Native Americans and the United States army - accidental discharge of a weapon led to a panic and the Army opened fire, massacring nearly all the Native Americans there |
| Homestead Act | Law offering free land to people willing to start new farms on the Great Plains signed in 1862 (160 acres) |
| cowboy | person who worked with cattle on ranches in the West |
| miners | people who dig for gold or other precious metals or minerals |
| pioneer | an early settler of a region |
Created by:
mrsgannon
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