Primary vs. Secondary Documents
Primary Source: a document or physical object which was written or created during the time under study.
• ORIGINAL DOCUMENTS: Diaries, speeches, manuscripts, letters, interviews, news film footage, autobiographies, official records
• CREATIVE WORKS: Poetry, drama, novels, music, art • RELICS OR ARTIFACTS: Pottery, furniture, clothing, buildings
Secondary Source: interprets and analyzes primary sources. These sources are one or more steps removed from the event.
• PUBLICATIONS: Textbooks, magazine articles, histories, criticisms, commentaries, encyclopedias
http://www.princeton.edu/~refdesk/primary2.html
I. Settlers moved to the west in the 1850s and conflicts arose with Indians
1. Reservations : areas of federal land put aside for Native Americans
2. Sand Creek Massacre (1864):Cheyenne surrendered, US military killed over 200 men women and children
3. Battle of Little Bighorn (1876): gold discovered in the Black Hills (SD). Sioux refused to leave. Crazy Horse and Sitting Bull led the Sioux to a
victory. “Custer’s Last Stand”
4. Wounded Knee (1890): (SD) After Sitting Bull is killed, Indians leave the reservations. This is the last war on the Plains.
5. Dawes Act (1887): Gave Indians land ownership (160 acres). Also gave Indians U.S. Citizenship
II. Reasons to move west:
1. Discovery of gold2. Transcontinental RR3. Offers of free land
a. Homestead Act: 160 acres of land for a registration fee and a promise to live on the land for 5 years. b. Morrill Act: granted 17 million acres of land to the states
4. Cattle kingdomsa. New farming techniques (dry farming)b. Farming inventions (John Deere steel plow)
Pre 1800EnglandGermanyIrelandScandinaviaAfricaScotlandIreland
•Skilled workers •Spoke English •Most were Protestant (except Irish)
•Settled outside cities on farms
1800-1900HungaryCzechGreecePolandRussiaSlovakiaChineseJapaneseArmenia Jews •Unskilled workers industrial jobs in cities •Spoke little English •Different religious beliefs:Greek OrthodoxyCatholicismJudaismBuddhism
By the turn of the century (1900), there were as many Italians living in New York City as in Naples, as many Germans as in Hamburg, and twice as many Irish as in Dublin. Immigrant populations were large in other cities and in rural areas across America.
Chinese Immigration Came from China for the 1849 GOLD RUSH
youngsinglepeasants
Cheap labor Construct RR’s Peddlers Agricultural workGarment working
substitute for slave labor
Negatives:ChinatownsDid “dirty” jobsOpium densProstitutionGambling
Restrictions on Chinese Immigration
Naturalization Act of 1870restricted immigration to “white persons and persons of African descent”
Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882suspended Chinese immigrationprohibited Chinese from becoming citizens
Geary Act (2nd Chinese Exclusion Act) 1892
Irish Immigration - 1846• Ireland ~ 4 million people• Major industry is agriculture• Major crop is the potato• Blight AKA the “Irish Famine” in 1845 ruins ¾ of the crop of potatoes
• 1 million die from starvation, typhus
http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/USAEireland.htm
Irish to the United States • 2 million emigrate to the United States by 1854• Lived in cities (NYC, Philly, Boston*, Chicago)• Poor, did not own land• Built RR’s, coalminers, fought in the Civil War• Democrats – feared the slave
would compete for jobs
• Stereotypes:Catholics that fought with others
Bought votesStuffed ballot boxesDrunksAnimal-like (dogs, apes)
Italian Immigration•Poverty•Illiteracy (70%)•Overpopulation•Natural disaster
- Mt Vesuvias (buried a town- Mt Etna (killed 100,000
people)•Division between north and south
- relied on la famiglia (the family) instead of Italians as a cohesive ethnic group Between 1880
and 1920, 4 MILLION
Italians entered the
U.S.
Italian ImmigrationIn America:
young, single men in their 20’sstayed in cities (no farming)construction work (bridges, roads, the first
skyscrapers)began as migrant workers “birds of passage”
Negatives:Catholics (seen as oppressive)Fought with the Irish, Portuguese, Polish“dirty” (menial jobs with little education)Little Italy (clusters of ethnicity)AnarchistsOrganized crime