William Stark
Professor Lynda Katz
Art Appreciation
March 5, 2016
The Colorado River Basin Horses, Indians and Cowboys have been around for many of years. Imagine the West without horses- no swift ponies, cavalry steeds, or stagecoach teams. No spirit guides, wild mustangs, racers, or rodeo broncos. Actually Spanish conquistadors brought horses to North America as late as the mid-1500’s. Horse culture dominated the West until the arrival of trains and automobiles in the twentieth century. In the art of the West, the always popular horse is a timeless icon. Native Americans are also a favorite in western art. Often they have been portrayed as mythical figures- sometimes as primitive people living in an undisturbed wilderness, at other times
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I went to the Rockwell Museum in Corning, NY. While I was at the Rockwell Museum I had noticed they had a lot of The Colorado River Basin on display. When I went into the room there was one photograph that had really caught my eye. It doesn’t have a name but it was taken in Kremmling, Colorado by Peter McBride. The image shows a horse pasture that is all dirt and or sand; the image is taken from about three hundred feet above ground. Horses in the headwaters as well as throughout the basin require hay to survive since there is no vegetation. Agriculture takes more than three quarters of the Colorado River’s water. The photographer and the pilot (his father) were flying over the basin and yelled “Bank, bank, bank!” at his father who then turned the Cessna 180 degrees on one wing to get the right perspective. Within the pasture are a couple dozen horses and their shadows; when you first look at the picture you only see the shadows of the horses. If you look close at the photograph you can see the horses that are creating the shadows. The image is very colorful and funny. This photograph reminds me of every time I get in an aircraft because when you are just taking off or about to land you can see the shadows of everything. I feel like the illusion of there not being any horses to create the shadows makes this photograph a success; as well as the fact that it was the only one
There are many ways in which we can view the history of the American West. One view is the popular story of Cowboys and Indians. It is a grand story filled with adventure, excitement and gold. Another perspective is one of the Native Plains Indians and the rich histories that spanned thousands of years before white discovery and settlement. Elliot West’s book, Contested Plains: Indians, Goldseekers and the Rush to Colorado, offers a view into both of these worlds. West shows how the histories of both nations intertwine, relate and clash all while dealing with complex geological and environmental challenges. West argues that an understanding of the settling of the Great Plains must come from a deeper understanding, a more thorough knowledge of what came before the white settlers; “I came to believe that the dramatic, amusing, appalling, wondrous, despicable and heroic years of the mid-nineteenth century have to be seen to some degree in the context of the 120 centuries before them” .
In the introduction, Hämäläinen introduces how Plains Indians horse culture is so often romanticized in the image of the “mounted warrior,” and how this romanticized image is frequently juxtaposed with the hardships of disease, death, and destruction brought on by the Europeans. It is also mentioned that many historians depict Plains Indians equestrianism as a typical success story, usually because such a depiction is an appealing story to use in textbooks. However, Plains Indians equestrianism is far from a basic story of success. Plains equestrianism was a double-edged sword: it both helped tribes complete their quotidian tasks more efficiently, but also gave rise to social issues, weakened the customary political system, created problems between other tribes, and was detrimental to the environment.
Few events in history have impacted a culture as much as the introduction of the horse into plains Indian culture. The positive impact of the horse on North America's indigenous people has been romanticized forever in popular culture. The portrait of a plain Indian horse created by the likes of John Wayne and Clint Eastwood is far from complete. While the horse did make nearly every aspect of Native American life more efficient, the spread of horses also contributed to the violence in the southwestern region of the United States in three ways. The trade of horses among the plains Indians created competition for resources, encouraged and contributed to raiding, and allowed the domination of the region by the Apache Indians.
Colorado River Hydrosphere A case study of * River management * People interfering in the hydrosphere * Balancing water from one area to another The Colorado river - basic facts It flows through southwest United States and northwestern Mexico. It is 2334 km (1450 miles long), the longest river west of the Rocky Mountains. Its source is west of the Rocky Mountains which is the watershed in northern Colorado, and, for the first 1600km (1000miles) of its course, passes through a series of deep gorges and canyons that were created by the eroding force of its current. The river flows in a generally southwestern direction across Colorado into south eastern Utah, where it is joined by its chief tributary, The Green River. After crossing the northern portion of Arizona, the Colorado flows west for 436 km (271 miles) through the majestic Grand Canyon.
Any discussion of the American culture and its development has to include mythology, because that is where most of the information about early America is found. Mythology is a unique source in that it gives a shared understanding that people have with regard to some aspect of their world. The most important experience for American frontiersmen is the challenge to the “myth of the frontier” that they believed in – “the conception of America as a wide-open land of unlimited opportunity for the strong, ambitious, self-reliant individual to thrust his way to the top.” (Slotkin, 5) In particular, the challenge came from Indians and from the wilderness that they inhabited.
Cooper's romanticizing of the Old West, created an inaccurate picture of Native Americans, but he was not the only one. Eighteenth and Nineteenth-century literature shows us many incorrect representations of Native Americans. With passages like the one above, captivity narratives, and the descriptions of Indian wars, is it any wonder that people were afraid of the Indians they would encounter out west? When people moved out into the frontier all the biased opinions they had been fed went with them. They took the mental pictures that the media of the day proposed and made them real in their minds eye. But the fear they took with them was almos...
On the night of the 29th of December 1890 the American Government destroyed Native American culture, yet again. As well as slaughtering the members of the Lakota tribe present that evening the officers slaughtered the horses. In Native American culture horses play a significant role both as a form of transport, but also as a symbol of hope. Therefore the brutal slaughter of the horses was effective in destroying the Native American culture on two levels; intellectual and emotional. Throughout Reservation Blues Alexie uses the symbol of screaming horses whenever an event that is detrimental to Native American culture occurs. White Plume describes the
The Grand Canyon has a lot of different features and is an exciting place that holds a lot of secretes and mysteries that scientists have been trying to figure out since the Grand Canyon was formed. It is millions of years old, over 277 miles wide, 18 miles wide, and defies many normal Geography features that are true in every other situation. Many theories have been presented that seek to explain the formation of the Grand Canyon. The first theory is that the Grand Canyon has a lot of Erosional Scarp Face’s, that have come together over the years, which is one theory that has been presented. Scientists have also tried to see if the Colorado River cutting into the canyon caused the Grand Canyon.
Life is colorful and adventurous, especially if you belong to the military life style. Belonging to the military community for nearly two decades has given me a different outlook on each place we end up. Outdoor enthusiasts, like most military families are, make Colorado Springs a desirable duty stationed. The perfect location Colorado Springs has. The weather offers many clear, beautiful days, allowing Colorado Springs to be a playground to enjoy most of the year round. Many points of interest and vacation sights that can be done in or around Colorado Springs make it a favorite in the military community.
The Native American Indians had no beasts of burden, no plows, no wagons, no means of transportation, and no way to move heavy objects other than by their own power. The Europeans brought over horses, oxen, donkeys, and camels. Horses became very valuable to the Native Americans. For the hunter-gatherers or nomads, the effect was beneficial because the horse enabled them to cover great distances, and hunters could locate and kill the bison more easily. H...
Over the years, the idea of the western frontier of American history has been unjustly and falsely romanticized by the movie, novel, and television industries. People now believe the west to have been populated by gun-slinging cowboys wearing ten gallon hats who rode off on capricious, idealistic adventures. Not only is this perception of the west far from the truth, but no mention of the atrocities of Indian massacre, avarice, and ill-advised, often deceptive, government programs is even present in the average citizen’s understanding of the frontier. This misunderstanding of the west is epitomized by the statement, “Frederick Jackson Turner’s frontier thesis was as real as the myth of the west. The development of the west was, in fact, A Century of Dishonor.” The frontier thesis, which Turner proposed in 1893 at the World’s Columbian Exposition, viewed the frontier as the sole preserver of the American psyche of democracy and republicanism by compelling Americans to conquer and to settle new areas. This thesis gives a somewhat quixotic explanation of expansion, as opposed to Helen Hunt Jackson’s book, A Century of Dishonor, which truly portrays the settlement of the west as a pattern of cruelty and conceit. Thus, the frontier thesis, offered first in The Significance of the Frontier in American History, is, in fact, false, like the myth of the west. Many historians, however, have attempted to debunk the mythology of the west. Specifically, these historians have refuted the common beliefs that cattle ranging was accepted as legal by the government, that the said business was profitable, that cattle herders were completely independent from any outside influence, and that anyone could become a cattle herder.
The Great Plains were once home to a wide variety of nomadic Indian tribes. These tribes relied on buffalo for food, clothing, weapons and shelter. Eventually people from the east decided to move west with the hopes of securing new land and making more money. Buffalos became the pioneers’ source of food and fun. The settlers left the landscape littered with the decomposing remnants of their prey. Due to the mass hunting of buffalo, their population vastly decreased. In the image from Harper`s Weekly, the audience can see a white buffalo hunter, who is in the process of skinning his prey. This picture illustrates certain praised virtues and stereotypes of the American West.
The cowboys of the frontier have long captured the imagination of the American public. Americans, faced with the reality of an increasingly industrialized society, love the image of a man living out in the wilderness fending for himself against the dangers of the unknown. By the end of the 19th century there were few renegade Indians left in the country and the vast expanse of open land to the west of the Mississippi was rapidly filling with settlers.
Colorado is a beautiful and historical state; the wide open plains, the glorious tall mountains, the history of its people that have shaped Colorado into what it is today. There is a lot to explore and learn when it comes to the Centennial State. Because of its history, Colorado is considered to be the meeting ground amongst three sections in the American West; the Atlantic Coast and Mississippi Valley, North and South, and Massachusetts and Virginia. These sections have shaped and developed the settlement and region in their own special ways.
In ‘horse,’ the speaker describes a horse being betrayed and then killed in a small town in Texas. The first two stanzas described the horse thundering towards outstretched hands being attracted to a field of corn but instead it is attacked by a group of white teenage boys who leave it mutilated. The sheriff of the town does not do anything because he believes that it is in their nature to do so. In the last stanzas the Mexican owner puts the horse out of his misery and someone tries to pay him for the damage. His people are disappointed because they believe that money could not make up for the death of the horse but, they do nothing about it. It would seem the horse in the poem is meant to represent the Mexican culture and how it is being eradicated by the dominant white society in the United States.