A History of the United States: Chapter 19: Opening the West

According to newspaper reports, miners there were making $20 a day panning for gold. That was a large sum of money at a time when many workers earned less than $1 a day.

Mining the ore and then extracting the gold from it required machinery, workers, and an organized business.

To help with high construction costs, the government gave railroad companies large subsidies—financial aid and land grants.

In the 1850s, railroad companies began to search for a route for a transcontinental rail line—one that would connect the Atlantic and Pacific coasts.

To make rail service safer and more reliable, the American Railway Association—a group that included the nation's railroad companies—divided the country into four time zones in 1883. All communities within a time zone would have the same time. Each zone was exactly one hour later than the zone to its west.

To reach the railroads located in Missouri, and later in Kansas, Nebraska, Colorado, and Wyoming, Texas ranchers had to drive their cattle hundreds of miles.

Western cowhands of Hispanic background were known as vaqueros. The vaqueros represented a long tradition of ranching in the Spanish Southwest.

Several factors brought settlers to the Great Plains.

The policy brought farmers to the Plains to homestead—earn ownership of land by settling on it.

Farmers on the Great Plains had to adapt to the environment and unusual conditions on the plains. Known as sodbusters, these farmers developed new farming methods and tools.

Most, including the Sioux, the Comanche, and the Blackfoot, were nomadic. They moved often and traveled long distances, following huge herds of buffalo—their main source of food, clothing, shelter, and tools.

The commission recommended moving all Native Americans to a few large reservations—areas of land set aside for them.

Native American leaders wanted to ensure that their people would be able to farm and hunt.

Army troops surrounded the Nez Perce and initiated a five-day siege.

The first large farmers' organization was a network of local groups that became the National Grange.

It set up "cash-only" cooperatives, stores owned by and operated for the benefit of farmers. Cooperatives charged lower prices than regular stores and provided an outlet for farmers' crops.

In February 1890, Alliance members formed the People's Party of the U.S.A., also known as the Populist Party. The party's goals were rooted in populism, or an appeal to the common people.

Populists also wanted to replace the nation's gold-based currency.

In spite of their mutual interests, many white Southerners would not join their forces with African American Populists.