Introduction

In the last quarter of the nineteenth century, the industrial age reached the South and the West. Its arrival created hope among both the economic promoters of the regions and the workers who migrated west in search of economic and political independence. Black Exodusters moved to Kansas for the promise of cheap land and voting rights. Cattlemen followed the newly completed Transcontinental Railroad into the Great American Desert. These migrants were part of a global tide of immigration to the United States and other places of economic opportunity, including Canada, Asia, and South America. The South, with its primarily agricultural economy and its low industrial wages, provided few options for these new migrants from overseas, but the frontiers of the West inspired dreams of wealth and freedom. These dreams conflicted with the lives of the Indian tribes who, as shown in the photograph below, lived in a variety of geographical and cultural settings throughout the West. The economies of both regions suffered from conflicts between racial and ethnic groups. They also struggled because they relied almost exclusively on producing raw materials such as timber, cotton, and minerals, most of which were shipped to factories in the North and Europe. This process effectively shipped most of the wealth out of the regions and subjugated southerners and westerners in a colonial economic system. This system caused a cycle of economic booms and busts that led to the exploitation of the environment as well as the intensification of conflict between blacks and whites in the South and among the many cultures that clashed in the West.

The Web activities for this chapter explore the relationships between races and cultures in the new economies of the South and the West. The additional links provide supplemental sources from and about the diverse peoples who populated these regions.

Web Activities 

1.  Read the testimony of Benjamin Singleton, a leader of the Exoduster movement, before Congress in 1880 on the subject of blacks moving to Kansas. Why does he say he encouraged blacks to move to Kansas? Who did he encourage to move to Kansas? What, in his opinion, is "the Southern country out of joint"? Why do you think Congress is investigating these events at all?

2.  Read Joel Chandler Harris' story "Uncle Remus Initiates the Little Boy", the first of the enormously popular Uncle Remus stories that Harris published in 1881. Why would a white man in the New South publish stories such as these? What does it matter that the ex-slave Uncle Remus is telling these stories to a little white boy while the boy's mother, Miss Sally, overhears? How would you describe the relationship of Brer Rabbit and Brer Fox in the context of Southern society?

3.  The Counterpoint on page 579 discusses Frederick Jackson Turner's definition of the frontier. Examine another interpretation of Turner's frontier thesis and describe how it is different from the descriptions of the frontier in the text. Why does it matter whether we see the frontier as a single line that had disappeared by 1893 or a constantly shifting series of borders?

4.  Photographers used their new technology to capture images of the various cultures in the West. Edward Curtis, who took the photograph of a Sioux woman gathering firewood (above), documented the faces and lives of the various native tribes. Go to the Edward Curtis website. What can you learn about the lives of the Indians from these photos? Now examine the photographs at Indians of North America- The Native American Experience, 1864-1874. Pay particular attention to the group photos such as the Navajo Family or the White Settlers and the Santee Uprising. What kinds of expressions do you see on the faces of these Indians? Do they seem, for example, defeated or defiant? Do the expressions change when the photos mix whites and natives? How about warriors and families? Go to the site for the years 1875-1890. What differences, if any, do you notice between the types of pictures at the first site and those at the second?

Additional Research Links

The Southern Burden 

• Read Henry Grady's 1886 speech to an audience of Northerners. How does he define the New South? How does he distinguish it from the Old South?
• Read an archaeologist's explanation of how his science can help us learn more about the lives of sharecroppers and tenants in the New South.

Life In the New South

• Go to Jim Crow Laws to gain an understanding of the extent to which legal segregation pervaded the New South
• Plessy v. Ferguson Read the text of the case that established "separate but equal" as the law of the land. Pay particular attention to Justice Harlan's dissent, which showed incredible foresight regarding the consequences of the decision.

Western Frontiers

• The American West. Browse this site to examine how an eastern magazine sold the image of the West to its readers.
• Read Emmeline Wells' defense of the Mormon tradition of plural marriage. How, in her opinion, does polygamy free women from "bondage"?
• The Nez Perce and Seminole tribes have particularly good sites dealing with their histories.
• Read the account of the battle of Little Big Horn by the Lakota Chief Red Horse.