Part 21

[5] CALIFORNIA AND NEBRASKA routes. That begun in California is called the Central Pacific. The one leaving Omaha is the Union Pacific. Both lines have many branches. On the California side the first passenger train reached the top of the Sierra, Nov. 30, 1867. The Union Pacific did not push its work until the war was nearly over. By the autumn of 1866 it was forty miles west of Fort Kearney. By the time the Central Pacific was in the Truckee Valley (140 miles built), the Union Pacific was at the Black Hills (500 miles built). Brigham Young built a portion of the road in Utah.

KANSAS, NEVADA, NEBRASKA AND COLORADO ADMITTED.

Kansas came into the Union (1861) as the seceding States went out. Though peaceful progress was arrested by the war, which kept most of her able-bodied men in the field, she, the youngest State, did her part bravely and well in that memorable conflict of arms, by the side of the older ones. She kept the name of the nation which had dwelt along her great river before the coming of the white men. With the cessation of civil strife began an era of prosperity, hardly paralleled in the history of the nation, and owing, chiefly, to the fertility of her soil, which has raised her to the front rank of agricultural States.

NEVADA[1] may be said to have sprung from the side of California, though originally forming part of Utah. For a time it was known only as Washoe, from the Indians living about the east foot of the great Sierra.

A little surface gold was found here as early as 1850 by emigrants who carried the news to California. Their report brought a number of eager gold-seekers into the gulches around what has since grown up to be Virginia City, and it was while searching for gold that rich silver ores were discovered early in 1859, on Mount Davidson. Here on the eastern slope of this mountain, near the newly discovered silver lode, the town of Virginia began with a few log huts. In sixteen years it had a population of twenty-five thousand. In 1864 Nevada was admitted to the Union.

NEBRASKA[2] in soil and climate is quite like Kansas, though somewhat less fertile. Though opened to settlement at the same time Kansas was, emigration was mostly directed to the latter State by the slavery excitement. In 1861 the area of Nebraska was much reduced by the forming of Dakota, though it is still larger than all New England. Omaha,[3] Plattsmouth, and Nebraska City grew up as outfitting points for the commerce of the plains. All were villages in 1857. As the railway system of Iowa unerringly directed itself toward the Platte, Omaha, the capital, grew in importance; but when the terminus of the Pacific Railway was fixed there, its future was assured. From this time onward the progress of Nebraska was marked. In 1867 it came into the sisterhood of States.

COLORADO was named for the great river which rises among its mountains. It was formed (1861) of portions taken from New Mexico, Utah and Kansas. Besides its mineral wealth, the raising of sheep and cattle has grown to be a great industry. In 1876 Colorado was admitted to the Union.

FOOTNOTES

[1] NEVADA, Spanish for "snowy," is aptly called "The Desert State." Except lead and silver it produces little or nothing. Carson, the capital, is named for Fremont's old guide. Though silver-mines were also opened in the Reese River District (Austin) the chief mineral deposits were found about Virginia City. A great rush set in there from California, where the excitement about Washoe quite rivalled, for a time, that of 1849. Here are the great Comstock, Gould and Curry and other rich silver lodes. This explains why population is chiefly concentrated in one spot in the west of the State. California is its natural outlet. In sixteen years the Comstock mines yielded over two hundred million dollars in silver bullion.

[2] NEBRASKA. When I visited Nebraska (April, 1858), a few settlements were begun on the Nemaha, Saline, Big Blue, and Elkhorn, but all would not have made one good-sized town. The great tide of western travel set through Independence, Kansas City, Leavenworth and St. Joseph. In 1872 the London _Times_ openly discouraged emigration to Nebraska, urging the Red River country instead. Western Nebraska is unfertile.

[3] OMAHA is six hundred miles from St. Louis by the Missouri River, five hundred from Chicago, and 1,898 from San Francisco. It has a charming site. In 1866 its population had risen to eight thousand.

THE RECENT STATES.

It is at least worthy of notice, in following out the law governing the movement of our people from east to west, that the great block of wilderness country which Lewis and Clarke first explored should be the last settled. The course their explorations took passes through Dakota, Montana, Idaho and Washington to the Pacific Ocean.

The reason for this long pause between the first and last acts in the story of the Great West is found in the fact that later exploration soon determined in favor of the Platte Valley, as the one affording by far the shortest way through the centre of the continent.

Therefore the new States, just named, are mostly an outgrowth of the more central region in which the great body of emigration has first settled. It may be further remarked, that in those Territories where gold and silver occur, settlement was nearly simultaneous.

IDAHO,[1] like Nevada, grew up from the discovery of gold and silver in her borders. The finding of these precious metals goes no farther back than the summer of 1862. These were placer deposits. A year later quartz lodes, rivalling in richness those of Colorado, were brought to light. Soon the old Hudson's Bay post of Fort Boisé[2] was turned into a thrifty town. The mineral find rapidly extended along the Salmon, Boisé, and Clearwater Rivers. In the south, Idaho City sprung up on the Boisé; in the north, Lewiston on the Clearwater was settled. In 1860 Idaho scarcely had any white people: in 1863 they were sufficiently numerous to entitle them to have a Territorial government.

WASHINGTON[3] is another rib taken from the side of the older Oregon, whose boundaries so fortunately gave us the magnificent harbors embraced by Puget Sound. Here therefore is the natural terminus of the Northern Pacific Railway,[4] which comes from Duluth and St. Paul, crosses the tier of States now under consideration, and reaches Tacoma by way of the Lower Columbia. Washington was made a State in 1889.

MONTANA.[5] About all known of this Territory in 1860 was that it contained two important military posts: Fort Benton at the head of navigation on the Missouri, and Fort Union near the mouth of the Yellowstone. But in 1861 gold was found in a gulch lying at the head of the Jefferson Fork of the Missouri. Population rushed in. Here Bannack City was founded. As with Colorado and Nevada, so here the surface diggings were quickly worked out. In 1862 Virginia City was founded as the successor of Bannack; and in 1863 Helena as the successor of Virginia, and supply-point for the mines of the Blackfeet country. Montana was organized as a Territory in 1864. A year later there were but four post-offices, at which tri-weekly mails were received, while but one newspaper was printed in the Territory. Yet even at this early day, when mining engrossed the attention of nine-tenths of the population, it was seen that the agricultural resources of Montana were very great, and since the building of the Northern Pacific Railway along the Yellowstone, that valley has become to Montana what the Willamette is to Oregon. Montana was admitted to the Union in 1889.

DAKOTA has signally demonstrated its capacity for supporting large populations, either by raising grain crops or live stock, for which the wild grasses of the plains furnish abundant pasturage. Divided by the Missouri in the centre, and bounded on the east by the Red River of the North, Dakota has come to be a great wheat-producing region in its eastern half, and a cattle-growing one in its western. Made a Territory in 1861, Dakota came into the Union as two States (North Dakota and South Dakota) in 1889.

WYOMING contains in its north-western corner the wonderful Yellowstone Park, which Congress with wise forecast has set apart for the benefit and instruction of mankind. At no distant day this remarkable and picturesque region bids fair to become the chosen playground of the nation.

Thus the Great American Desert, which only to have crossed was once thought a feat worthy of being handed down to posterity, whose length and breadth were vividly portrayed as never meant to be inhabited by man, is now everywhere supporting large and prosperous populations.

It is but just to add that the Mormons first disproved this popular fallacy by making their homes in the heart of the desert, which imperfect knowledge first led them to choose, and necessity afterward forced to make trial of. These people have therefore done a work as remarkable in its way as that performed by the early New-England colonists.

It should further be added, that the occupation of these Territories, notably Montana and Dakota, was productive of serious conflicts with the Indians, who fought to the death for the preservation of their last hunting-grounds. The Sioux war of 1876 was caused by the rush of gold-seekers into the Black Hills, which the Sioux had reserved to themselves. They attacked the whites, to whose aid soldiers were sent. One band led by General Custer perished to a man on the Little Big-Horn, in battle with confederate Indians, led by Sitting Bull, a Sioux chief.

FOOTNOTES

[1] IDAHO. Indian, said to signify "shining mountains," more fully interpreted by some to mean "gem of the mountains." Originally part of Oregon. The Territory contains the great falls of the Shoshone, or Snake, or Lewis River. Fremont's Peak is its great landmark on the east.

[2] BOISÉ (see p. 241) became a government post upon our occupation of Oregon. The capital was first fixed at Lewiston, then removed to Boisé.

[3] WASHINGTON. Besides the excellence of its harbors, Washington is noted for its inexhaustible forests, thus making it a great lumber-producing region. In the eastern part wheat is grown, and there are good grazing lands.

[4] NORTHERN PACIFIC RAILWAY unites the railway and water systems of the Great Lakes and Upper Mississippi with the Pacific. It is the route forecast by Jona. Carver in 1766. (See p. 149.)

[5] MONTANA. The name is simply descriptive of a mountainous region. Fort Benton was named for Thomas H. Benton. From this point returning trappers or traders were in the habit of floating down the river to St. Louis in canoes before the day of steamboats. Fort Union was a trading-post established with reference to the Yellowstone Valley route to the mountains.

THE WORK OF EIGHTY YEARS.

Our story closes with the national domain completed within limits grander than even the sagacious Jefferson had hoped for. Though "peace hath her victories," peaceful development, such as has followed the settlement of grave political questions, affords fewer materials for history than the stirring records of war, or the annals of political strife.

The West shared with the East in the drain made upon its resources by the Secession War. Its recovery from the effects of that war has, however, been so marked that to-day all traces of it are nearly effaced from its outward and inward life. National unity is no longer a thing of territorial expansion, as with the statesmen of Jefferson's and Benton's time, but now means a perfect union of the whole people in the cause of progress, and for the welfare of mankind. In that peaceful conflict the once hostile sections are now engaged with a praiseworthy emulation.

The child who was born when Lewis and Clarke set out for the Pacific, may now be the living witness to what we have called the marvel of the nineteenth century. It is true, much of the rapid progress of the Great West is due to the development of its extraordinary mineral wealth, by which masses of population have been suddenly moved upon particular points, so forcing settlement beyond its legitimate growth.

There have been, however, other potent agencies at work to the same end. Foremost among these, always keeping in mind the constantly improving facilities for moving emigrants into the West, come the great improvements made in mechanical arts. And first of all we should class the reaping-machine, invented by Cyrus H. McCormick, which is thought to have advanced the line of civilization westward many miles each year. Without this invention, what was an uninhabited and unproductive region forty years ago would hardly have been converted into the granary of the continent, with its millions of people, its marvellous productiveness, and its growing weight in the nation. In the East small farms are the rule; in the West, the exception. The difference, at least, seems to be largely owing to the grass-mower, and grain-reaping machines that were unknown to agriculturists of a former generation, though allowance must be made for the better conditions of soil, which more generally adapt it for cultivation. Great bodies of fertile lands, such as exist in the States of Kansas and Nebraska, are unknown in the East.

Then the building of the Pacific railways has contributed greatly to the rise of the West. Munificently endowed by Government with moneys and lands, the sale of the latter to settlers became an instant and potent means to the building-up of the unoccupied country. In its pre-emption and homestead laws the Government has also offered unusual privileges to all who wished to settle on the vacant public domain; thus putting within the reach of men of small means, the most valuable and productive farming lands in the world. In this respect no government has done so much for its middle-class population as ours. And no population has more quickly returned to the giver the benefits it has received.

One other active means to the making of the Great West should not be overlooked. Passing by the explorers, whose names are familiar, we come to a class of men whose work was no less important in its way. Trained journalists like Horace Greeley, Samuel Bowles, Albert D. Richardson, Henry Villard, Thomas W. Knox, and William Phillips, did much to make the West known to the East in all its aspects, whether political, social, or economical, so depicting its inside and outside life to a multitude of readers, many of whom became actual emigrants in consequence.

These combined agencies, all working together in harmony, have produced extraordinary results. For instance, at the time we bought it all Louisiana, counting from New Orleans to the Missouri, had only about forty-five thousand people. In 1880, under not quite eighty years of American rule, it had over eleven millions, or more than twice as many as all the States had when Louisiana was ceded to us. The whole population of French and Spanish Louisiana did not equal that of Minneapolis, St. Paul, or Kansas City at the present time, neither of which had a single settler at the date of cession.

Spain thought to control the continent with a few soldiers and missionaries. Her civilization, barbaric in its origin, is mediæval rather than modern. In America it could rise no higher than its source. Mexico and Cuba, two of its earliest conquests, show what it has been able to do in the New World in three hundred and fifty years of rule.

France frittered away her opportunities in schemes too vast for the time or the means appointed for their accomplishment. It is the story of force without forecast. Her explorers overran the country, but left few substantial footmarks behind them. One reads French names everywhere, but sees no cities founded. The policy of France, like that of Spain, looked more to getting a revenue from America than colonizing it. Hence every avenue of individual effort was made to lead back to the royal exchequer.

Now let the man who is not yet fifty years old take down the geography he studied when a schoolboy, and put his finger in the middle of the State of Iowa. He will have touched the border of that Great American Desert whose story we have been telling him.

INDEX.

Acoma visited and described by the Spaniards, 35, 39 (_note_); further description, 42, 43; mission church of, 52.

Adams, John Quincy, defends the right of petition, 248.

Alamo, The, 243, 246 (_note_).

Alaska, settlements in and purchase of, by the United States, 142 (_note_).

Aleutian Archipelago discovered, 141; beginnings of the fur-trade at, 141; settlements, 142 (and _note_).

Allouez, Fr. Claude, goes to Lake Superior, 77; goes with Dablon to the Wisconsin River, 78.

American Fur Company organized, 212.

Apaches of New Mexico, 255.

Arizona, missions in, 38; the name, 39 (_note_).

Arizona bought of Mexico, 288, 289.

Arkansas nation, Joliet and Marquette visit them, 89; towns, 90, 92 (_note_); called "handsome men," 91.

Arkansas Post in 1803, 178.

Arkansas River, settlement begun on, 127.

Arkansas Territory settlements (1819), 222, 223 (_note_).

Arkansas admitted to the Union, 227.

Ashburton treaty, 239, 241 (_note_).

Astor, John Jacob, plans an establishment on the Columbia, 212.

Astoria founded, 213; sold, 214, 230, 233 (_note_).

Atchison, David R., 299 (_note_).

Atchison, Kan., founded, 296, 299 (_note_).

Austin, Stephen F., goes to Texas, 242.

Behring, Vitus, sails on a voyage of discovery, 140, 142 (_note_); determines the separation of the continents, 140; death, 141.

Bent, Charles, governor of New Mexico, 254.

Bent's Fort, 241 (_note_), 254, 256 (_note_).

Benton, Thomas H., 227; sent to the Senate, 229; identified with the Oregon question, 231; meets Fremont, 234.

Bienville, 123, 130 (note); made governor, 128; founds New Orleans, 128.

Bison, The, first mentioned, 36, 39 (_note_).

Black Hills located, 185.

Boone, Daniel, leads emigrants to Kentucky, 165, 211 (_note_).

Bonneville, Benjamin L. E., visits Oregon, 232, 233 (_note_).

Boundary of the United States, rectified by the war with Mexico, 263.

Brown, John, in Kansas, 304, 307 (_note_).

Butterfield Overland Stage Company, 317, 320 (_note_).

Button, Sir Thomas, in Hudson's Bay, 133.

Cabrillo's voyage, 65 (_note_).

Cache-à-la-Poudre River, 238, 241 (_note_).

California, the name, 55, 65 (_note_); coast explored, 55-59; missions founded, 59-63; commercial policy under Spanish rule, 64, 65; coveted by the United States, 256; why, 257; emigration to, 263 (_note_); we fail to buy it, 258; or separate it from Mexico, 288; England suspected of coveting it, 258; the American settlers seize the government, 261; the flag raised at Monterey, 261; conquered, 262; in revolt again, 262; subdued, 263; Mexico cedes it to the United States, 263; gold discovered, 272; rush for the mines, 274; newspapers of, in 1848, 274, 275 (_note_); effect on the country, 278, 279 (_note_); routes to, 280, 281, 282, 284 (_note_); commerce opened with the interior, 283; population in 1849, 284; under military government, 285; the interregnum, 285; miners' courts, 286; State government formed, 287; struggle in Congress, 287; admitted to the Union a free State, 287; Pacific Railroad in, 318, 320 (_note_).

Calumet, The, 89; virtue of, 92 (_note_).

Canada, conquest of, 146 (_note_).

Cape Flattery named, 144, 146 (_note_).

Cape Mendocino, 65 (_note_).

Carson, Christopher, 234; stopped by Gen. Kearney, 256, 263 (_note_).

Carver, Jonathan, his idea, 149; gets to the Mississippi, 150; ascends the Minnesota, 151; his "Travels," 152.

Cenis Indians, 116, 117 (_note_).

Champlain, Samuel de, founds Quebec, 69; at Montreal, 71; hears about the Great Lakes, 71, 72; a prisoner, 74, 79 (_note_).

Charles V. (of Spain), events of his reign, 4-8; last days of, 53, 54; his character, 81.

Childs, J. B., on the way to Oregon, 237.

Chouteau, Peter, 198, 204 (_note_).

Cibola, Father Marco goes to, 32, 39 (_note_).

Clarke, William, explores Louisiana, 187, 191 (_note_). _See_ Lewis.

Clarke's River (Ore.) named, 197.

Clay, Henry, defeated on the Texas issue (1844), 245.

Colorado, gold in, 208; discoveries on Cherry Creek, 309; Denver City founded, 310; great rush of gold-seekers, 310; stage-route established from the Missouri, 311; discoveries on Clear Creek, 312; Gregory, 312; other settlements, 313; surface diggings give out, 314; but gold quartz struck, 314; a State, 322.

Colorado River explored, 33; the name, 39 (_note_).

Colorado Desert crossed, 65.

Columbia River missed by Cook, 145; and Vancouver, 146 (_note_); discovered, 161, 162 (_note_), 191 (_note_); a bone of contention, 230, 233 (_note_).

Columbia, the ship, 160, 161, 162 (_note_).

Columbus, Christopher, fails to find the way to India, 3; result of his discoveries, 3; his death, 4.

Cook, James, sent to the Pacific, 143, 146 (_note_); discovers Sandwich Islands, 144; names Cape Flattery and Mount Edgecumbe, 144, 145; tries to sail east to Hudson's Bay, 145; his death, 146.

Coppermine River explored, 137.

Coronado, Vasquez de, explores New Mexico, 32, 39 (_note_).

Cortez, Hernando, in Mexico, 7; reaches the Great South Sea, 7.

Council Bluffs, visited and named, 188; Long winters there, 221.

Coureurs de Bois, 125, 130 (_note_).

Crozat, Anthony, his monopoly, 124, 126.

Cuba, importance of, to Spanish conquests in America, 4.

Custer, George A., killed in battle, 325.

Dablon, Fr. Claude, founds mission at Sault Ste. Marie, 78, 80 (_note_).

Dakota, great progress in, 324.

De Fuca, Juan, discovers Straits of Fuca, 59.

Dubuque, Julien, in Iowa, 183.

Denver City founded, 310; in 1859, 313, 314 (_note_).

Denver, James W., 299 (_note_), 310.

De Soto, Hernando, lands in Florida, 11; his army, 11, 12; cruel conduct toward the natives, 13, 14, 22; his wonderful marches, 15, 17 (_note_); escape of his followers, 16; death and burial, 18; described, 17 (_note_).

Douglas, Stephen A., author of "Popular Sovereignty," 288.

Drake, Sir Francis, reaches California, 56; takes possession, and names it New Albion, 57; his port, 66 (_note_).

El Dorado. The Spaniards seek it in Florida, 14; the Indians mislead them, 28 (_note_).

El Paso del Norte founded, 37; in 1807, 208.

Elizabeth of England, her character, 147.

England claims the North-west coast, 146 (_note_); loses her American colonies, 165.

Falls of St. Anthony named, 107, 109 (_note_); Indian superstition about, 151.

Fire-worship, 46.

Florida discovered and named, 6; its extent, 6, 7; initial point, 7, 9 (_note_); De Soto invades it, 11; Indians of, 20-28; ceded back to Spain, 164.

Fontaine qui bouille, 314 (and _note_).

Fort Boisé, 233 (_note_); Fremont there, 238, 241 (_note_); made capital of Idaho, 323, 325 (_note_).

Fort Chipewyan, 138, 139 (_note_).

Fort Crèvecœur, 101, 104 (_note_).

Fort Hall, 233 (_note_), 238.

Fort Kearney, Neb., 294.

Fort Laramie, 235, 241 (_note_).

Fort Leavenworth, 293, 294 (_note_).

Fort Prudhomme, 103, 104 (_note_).