Westward Expansion Research Paper

Westward Expansion

The Range Wars In 1880 the Range wars put themselves against really wealthy cattleman. People such as ranchers, cowboys, sheep herders, and farmers participated.

Then, the homesteaders decided that they should buy the land that the ranchers had used for grazing their cattle. After they bought the land, they fenced it so they were not taking over or interacting with the cattlemens herds.

The Great Plains People called the homesteaders made their homes on the Great Plains, in the middle of North America. Other living creatures such as, Buffalo, Grizzly Bears, Wolves, Antelope, and Bobcats. There were also some groups of the tribes that lived on the Great Plains. Not all of them did but some. They were, the Indians,

It was more work than most people thought. The cowboy’s had to be able to rope a horse, or a cow while on foot, or on horseback. They had to know and learn lots of techniques for what they were doing.

The birth of a Cowboy The earliest cowboys were born “half horse and half alligator”. They were not born in Texas at first. In those days Texas still was part of Mexico.

In 1835 citizens of Texas won their own war. They fought against mexico. The war was named “The Independence War”. Texas fought against Mexico because they wanted to have their own State and not have to share with Mexico. So Texas won their war and then became their own State. So that is the story behind how Texas became their own State.

The Cattle Drive In Kansas at the time of 1867 the great cattle drives railroad continued for about the next 20 years. That was one of the Cowboy’s busiest years. Americans headed west because that was when California was having a Gold Rush around 1849.

The Texas cowboy’s drove their cattle to on the California trail to San Francisco. The cowboy’s could buy longhorns in Texas for about 10 dollars. After they bought the longhorns, they would go sell them in California for a 100 dollars each. But they sometimes lost some longhorns on the way to