Which of the following developments helps to explain the change in agricultural depicted in the graph?

The completion of the railroads to the West following the Civil War opened up vast areas of the region to settlement and economic development. White settlers from the East poured across the Mississippi to mine, farm, and ranch. African-American settlers also came West from the Deep South, convinced by promoters of all-black Western towns that prosperity could be found there. Chinese railroad workers further added to the diversity of the region's population.

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• Additional Navigation
• Which of the following developments helps explain the rise in exports from the west coast depicted in the graph?
• Which of the following developments best explains the reasons for the growth of a new urban culture?
• Which of the following historical developments contributed most directly to the market revolution?
• Which of the following was true of the Dawes Act of 1887?

Settlement from the East transformed the Great Plains. The huge herds of American bison that roamed the plains were almost wiped out, and farmers plowed the natural grasses to plant wheat and other crops. The cattle industry rose in importance as the railroad provided a practical means for getting the cattle to market.

The loss of the bison and growth of white settlement drastically affected the lives of the Native Americans living in the West. In the conflicts that resulted, the American Indians, despite occasional victories, seemed doomed to defeat by the greater numbers of settlers and the military force of the U.S. government. By the 1880s, most American Indians had been confined to reservations, often in areas of the West that appeared least desirable to white settlers.

The cowboy became the symbol for the West of the late 19th century, often depicted in popular culture as a glamorous or heroic figure. The stereotype of the heroic white cowboy is far from true, however. The first cowboys were Spanish vaqueros, who had introduced cattle to Mexico centuries earlier. Black cowboys also rode the range. Furthermore, the life of the cowboy was far from glamorous, involving long, hard hours of labor, poor living conditions, and economic hardship.

The myth of the cowboy is only one of many myths that have shaped our views of the West in the late 19th century. Recently, some historians have turned away from the traditional view of the West as a frontier, a "meeting point between civilization and savagery" in the words of historian Frederick Jackson Turner. They have begun writing about the West as a crossroads of cultures, where various groups struggled for property, profit, and cultural dominance. Think about these differing views of the history of the West as you examine the documents in this collection.

To find additional documents in Loc.gov on topics related to the West, use such keywords as West, ranching, Native Americans, and pioneers, or search using the names of states or cities in the West.

Documents

• The Architecture of the West
  • Denver, Colorado, 1898
  • Pueblo de Taos, New Mexico, 1891(?)
  • Old Mission Church, Los Angeles, California, between 1880 and 1899
  • Salt Lake City, Utah, 1896
  • The Old Carreta, Pueblo of Laguna, New Mexico, 1890
  • A Mexican Home (ranchita), between 1880 and 1897
• As Some Things Appear on the Plains and Among the Rockies in Mid-Summer
• Beef and Beans
  • John Robinson
  • Lee D. Leverett
  • Henry Young
• The Extermination of the American Bison
• I Will Go West
  • Edward Riley
  • Elizabeth Roe
• American Indian and Oklahoma Territories Maps
  • Indian territory.
  • Map of the Indian and Oklahoma territories.