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Economic impact on the indian removal act
Indian removal impacts on tribes
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In the early days of United States history market hunters took advantage of what seemed like an endless supply of wild game to sell furs, feathers and meat to colonial traders. Lewis and Clark reported of seeing herds of buffalo that stretched across the plains as far as the eye could see when first passing through this territory in 1804. Estimates of thirty to sixty million buffalo roamed the Great Plains. The demand for buffalo fur back east and in Europe created a market so strong that the Indians and white hunters would kill hundreds of thousands year after year. The government hired market hunters to kill all the buffalo, the native Indians major food source, to pressure the Indians onto reservations. The buffalo herd quickly diminished
Fishing and hunting have been at the core of many American Indian cultures like the Nisqually since precontact. Indian hunting, fishing and gathering were conducted then—as they are now—not for sport, but for food and for a livelihood. This was well understood by the early colonists and later by the U.S. government. Thus, many of the treaties (e.g., Medicine Creek, 1854) negotiated between the federal government and Indian tribes in the nineteenth century contained provisions guaranteeing rights to hunt and fish. In the trea¬ty negotiated by Isaac Stevens, the tribe ceded to the U.S. some of the Nisqually vil¬lages and prairies, but Article Three reserved the tribe’s right to fish “at all usual and accustomed grounds and stations…in common with all citizens of the Territory.” (FL 12) But the growth of the European American population, and with it the proliferation of fenced lands, the destruction of natural habitat, and often the destruction of wildlife itself, drastically curtailed the Indians' ability to carry on these activities. Charles Wilkinson’s thesis declares that the “messages from Frank’s Landing” are “messages about ourselves, about the natural world, about societies past, about this society, and about societies to come.” (FL 6)
Inventing the Savage: The Social Construct of Native American Criminality. Luana Ross. Austin: University of Texas Press. 1998.
The development of the transcontinental railroad was the most devastating technological development that affected the Plains Indians. Although the railroad was powerful and helpful to the white man, it was not for the Plains Indians. The transcontinental railroad was the reason why the westward movement of the white man happened so quickly. With the white man moving westward they found valuable land for agricultural, which to be the Plains Indians land, and they found a lot of gold mines. During the time of the building of the transcontinental railroad a lot of white man killed the buffalo. They found that as a sport, and even to use it to harm the Plains Indians. At that time the buffalo was a main source of food, fur, and a hunting lifestyle for the Plains Indians and by the white man killing it off it effectively hurt them. The white man killed the buffalo in large amount of numbers that they almost made them go instinct, and they hurt the Plains Indians huge. Although the Plains Indians did kill the buffalo for their food and furs, their hunting did not have a large impact on the buffalo population. Also, the transcontinental railroad went through the land that the Plains Indians lived on. They were forced to move into smaller areas that were designated by the government. A lot of wars happened over this issue, and over the issue of gold being on their land.
Before the migration, it’s estimated that ½ million people inhabited the west. There were 200 different tribes that had to deal with tribal wars and the need to survive on a daily basis. Horses and cattle gave the natives increased mobility and hunting abilities. In the South Western US, there were two types of natives, horse riders and non horse riders. The buffalo were used for meat, skins, and the dried manure was used as fire wood. The natives became nomads because they were being pushed away from the migrants. The document Excerpt from an Overland journey from New York to San Francisco by Horace Greeley is a detailed journal of a writer who traveled west. Greeley founded The New Yorker and was one of the biggest boosters for westward travel. On his journey in 1859, he talks about the many people he meets and where they are from. He describes the native mountain men as “Indians of all grades from the tamest to the wildest, half breeds, French trappers and voyageurs and an occasional negro, compose a medley such as hardly another region can parallel.
In “Promise of the High Plains,” a flyer created in the 1800s, it states, “The finest timber West of the Great Wabash Valley” (The Railroaders) when trying to convince the people why to move west. This flyer shows that Americans were advertising the timber on the western land to convince more people to move. Buffalo was also a very important resource for the Native American culture and way of life. Buffalo was used for food, clothing, and housing. Not only were Buffalo used for survival, but they were also part of their religious rituals.
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...
expansion on the native Americans of the Great Plains in the mid-19th century." History today. no. 4 (2006): 42.
The myth of the vanishing Indian was suggested by document 3, and advertisement aimed at wealthy eastern tourists. The advertisement suggested that Indians were vanishing because rather than taking up American land, Indians were now often found in agricultural and industrial pursuits. The reason why this myth was so popular however, was due to the fact that American entrepreneurs were profiting from Eastern tourism and the fact that the myth demonstrated the robbing of Indian land in a better, more favorable manner. The author of annual journal argued that after the extinction of the buffalo, many Indians were less reluctant to
The idea of Manifest Destiny was fresh in the minds of many Americans and politicians, and they wanted the United States to continue its expansion westward. In the early days of the trail, only daring and courageous traders crossed the Great Plains to Santa Fe, and their Native American encounters remained fairly peaceful, but after several years of use, large shipping businesses started to set up trading operations along the trail. This meant an even larger amount of newcomers to New Mexico and the surrounding lands. For many Native Americans living beside the trail, the added amount of newcomers was seen as a threat to their very livelihoods. As traders crossed the Native Americans’ lands, they often hunted and killed bison and other game that the Indians depended on for their food source. Later, as traders started buying large amounts of mules and other draught animals and transporting them back east to the United States, many Indians attacked the wagon parties and stole their goods and animals. Sometimes, the Indians would even kill members of the wagon party in their surprise attacks. In retaliation, some traders killed presumably innocent Native Americans that they encountered. With tensions still rising, military troops started the escort wagons crossing
Whitetail deer are major game for hunters today and have been a staple resource as far back as the first Indians in America, being their prominent source of meat (known as venison). Native Americans used the entire deer for survival in wilderness. Because deerskin had so many uses, it was highly sought after at that time. The Native Americans would mainly use it for clothing in the colder weather. These simple uses of the animal kept these people alive in the harsh conditions of the wilderness. During this period of time, deer were not killed for fun or for sport.
For a long period of time the Cheyenne tribe followed the buffalo. When the buffalo would migrate so would they. They used all parts of the buffalo for various things that helped them survive. They made their villages easy to pack up incase the herd left. The Women would attract the buffalo with colorful blankets when the men would shoot the buffalo with a bow and arrow. The women would do the cooking in the Cheyenne tribe. The main vegetables they would cook were corn, squash and beans. Their main sources of meat were buffalo and deer. They would make tools out of the bones of the animals they killed as well as make coats with the skin and fur. Most of the women wore animal skin skirts. The natives had strong beliefs about wasting any part of the animal so they would try to use
But the treaty was destined for failure. Commercial buffalo hunters essentially ignored the terms of the treaty as they moved into the area promised to the Southern Plains Indians. The great southern herd of American bison, lifeblood of the Southern Plains tribes, was all but exterminated in just four yearsfrom 1874 to 1878. The hunters slaughtered the animals by the thousands, sending the hides back East and leaving the carcasses to rot on the plainsand the U.S. government did nothing to stop them. The disappearance of the buffalo impoverished the tribes and forced them to depend on reservation rations.
Indians had been moved around much earlier than the nineteenth century, but The Indian Removal Act of 1830 was the first legal account. After this act many of the Indians that were east of the Mississippi river were repositioned to the west of the river. Tribes that refused to relocate ended up losing much of their land to European peoples (Sandefur, p.37). Before the Civil War in the U.S. many farmers and their families stayed away from the west due to a lack of rainfall (Nash et al., 2010). Propaganda in newspapers lured Americans and many other immigrants to the west to farm. The abundance of natural grasses in the west drew cattlemen and their families as well.
...ured to support the long drive and it was beginning to be criss-crossed by railroads. Not far behind the rancher creaked the prairie schooner of the farmers bringing their womenfolk and children, their draft horses, cows, and pigs. Under the Homestead Act they staked off their claims and fenced them in with barbed wire, ousting the ranch men from lands they had possessed without legal title. During the two terrible winters of 1886 and 1887, herds were annihilated in the open ranges by the freezing weather.
The American Indians Between 1609 To 1865. Native Americans or American Indians, once occupied the entire region of the United States. They were composed of many different groups, who spoke hundreds of languages and dialects. The Indians from the Southwest used to live in large, terraced communities and their way of sustain was from the agriculture where they planted squash, pumpkins, beans and corn crops. Trades between neighboring tribes were common, this brought in additional goods and also some raw materials such as gems, cooper.