Westward Expansion: Farming, Mining and Conservation

The Homestead Act: Farming the lone prairie The Myth- Small, hearty individual families hacking out an existence in the harsh new prairie on farms that the Homestead Act created. Jeffersonian yeoman farmers finally had their chance to strike out on their own for a better, healthy life than what the city offered. However, there were few of these types of farming due to the reality of the work. Without farming machines the work was backbreaking, and living in a sod house is hard to do.

The reality: Big Agra rules Instead of the small little farms like Laura Wilder grew up on, most of the farming out West were Bonanza farms, large agri- business. As shown here, extensive small scale farming just really did not exist, and it certainly was not the small scale farming that removed thousands of acres of sod to reveal the earth below it needed for farming. (More on that later…) As you can imagine, big agra requires big water, and also requires keeping out large herds of animals to prevent damage. In order to do this, barbed wire was invented to keep ranchers from running cattle through their farms. This was the cause of many range wars (Watch Young Guns…)

Cattle drives and cowboys One in three cowboys were freedmen who escaped to the West to find a new life and to escape Jim Crow and the KKK. There they found acceptance as they did originally in the Navy due to the type of work. Cattle drives really only lasted a short time. As large farming and more rail lines were laid, the large overland drives became less and less necessary.

The Myth of the West The Myth of the Miner-49rs… Rugged individuals living out in the West, mining gold with pans and sluices coming off the rivers and mountains. Getting rich by staking a claim, panning for gold and collecting the “color” of the land. Thousands of Americans and Chinese were convinced that the west contained literal rivers of gold, which pulled people from all over the world to try to strike their luck through hard work and perseverance.

Their reality In fact, very little gold was collected from the rivers. Miners typically worked to companies with situations very similar to sharecropping. Companies such as Levi Strauss and Abercrombie and Fitch and other Company supplies stores allowed miners to purchase equipment on credit, often over charging, and making it impossible to get out of debt.

The Mining reality The myth of the lone miner, out striking off on his own was not the reality. Large companies were the reality. Another reality of the West not often discussed are the actual mining techniques that were employed. Hydraulic mining is a technique that employs high pressure water that washes the gold down to sluices. The water mixes with mercury, which attaches to the gold weighing it down to be easily collected. This water in turn ran downstream with high levels of mercury in it, causing an ecological situation.

Lasting impacts. Another environmental situation was the debris that was washed down during this process, forever altering the landscape and removing hundreds of miles of rivers that was home to a wide variety of fish and used by ranchers for their cattle. This reshaping of the West has had long lasting impacts, both in ecology and in politics when understanding the West.

John Muir’s Yosemite “John Muir - born in Dunbar, Scotland, emigrated to the United States, settling in Wisconsin. In 1860 entered the University of Wisconsin. He made fine grades, but after three years left Madison to travel the northern United States and Canada, odd-jobbing his way through the yet unspoiled land.” “Through a series of articles appearing in Century magazine, Muir drew attention to the devastation of mountain meadows and forests by sheep and cattle. With the help of Century's associate editor, Robert Underwood Johnson, Muir worked to remedy this destruction. In 1890, due in large part to the efforts of Muir and Johnson, an act of Congress created Yosemite National Park. Muir was also personally involved in the creation of Sequoia, Mount Rainier, Petrified Forest and Grand Canyon national parks. Muir deservedly is often called the "Father of Our National Park System ".