Preview

The Role Of The Great Plains In The 1890's

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
352 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
The Role Of The Great Plains In The 1890's
The Great Plains has many agricultural activities and has a high agricultural sector in North America despite the dry climate, poor soils, and low vegetation. Many settlers moved to the Great Plains when farming became the largest economic sector in the region during the 19th and 20th centuries. The Great Plains economy became dependent on its primary sector, which this dependency brought the Great Plains vulnerable to decisions of distinct financial institutions, governments, and transportation authorities. By the 1890’s, many homesteaders and farmers abandon their lands due to the drought and the Great economic depression at the beginning of the 1890’s. Also, many farmers leave the Great Plains during the Great Depression in the 1930’s. The

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    The American West was viewed as a land of opportunity and success for many people of different racial and financial backgrounds during the time between 1865 to 1890. However, the extent of success from the opportunity varied on multiple factors. For the homesteader, opportunity was based upon good weather conditions and hard work but mostly only large scale corporations succeeded. Mining provided little for the average miner; large mining industries profited instead.. At some point West was the land of opportunity and at the same time it was not a land of opportunity for Native American Indians and Minorities.…

    • 366 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    In 1900-1930 families started buying land and moving to the plains. They would farm cash crops on the land but it was very hard work. The country was already in a depression and also the stock market crash. Their plants failed 5 years in a row. With no income they couldn’t pay mortgages.…

    • 298 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Dust Bowl Case Study

    • 1477 Words
    • 6 Pages

    The settlers of this area met with many challenges. The semiarid Great Plains offer lush farm land during wet years but it also alternates between wet years and years of drought. The cold winters initially presented the settlers with challenges. However, the settler’s response to the cold winters ensured their demise when the years of drought presented a new challenge.…

    • 1477 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    Farming originally became an attractive occupation because of the successful cultivation of the Great Plains. Settlers were attracted by the short grass pastures for cattle and sheep, the sod of the plains, and by the meadowlands of the mountains that could be found in this region. An influx in rainfall after the 1870s turned the formerly barren plains into workable farmland. The initial journey westward for farmers was by wagon or cart. These journeys were often very difficult and dangerous (Doc E). Climate and the threat of territorial Native Americans in the West made the journeys last for long, grueling months (Doc H). Also, the idea of the farmer's lifestyle was that of the sturdy, independent farmer. However, as drought and debt plagued the farmlands of the Great Plains in the late nineteenth century, fewer farmers sought to be independent and more sought to be commercial (Doc C). The lifestyle of the commercial farmer was reasonably better and less self-sufficient than that of the independent farmer; however, they were still plagued by overproduction and economic distress. The settlement of farmers also contributed to the development of the west in different ways. Farmers helped to create new markets and new outposts of commercial agriculture in the Great Plains for the nation's growing economy. The independent farmer began by cultivating the land and selling to national markets…

    • 867 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    North vs South

    • 3107 Words
    • 13 Pages

    The Great Depression is one of the most misunderstood events in not only American history but also Great Britain, France, Germany, and many other industrialized nations. It also has had important consequences and was an extremely devastating event in America. It was the longest and most severe depression ever experienced by the industrialized Western world. When the New York Stock Exchange crashed in October 1929, the United States dropped sharply into a major depression. The world was in wide demand for agricultural goods during World War I, but they had rapidly decreased after the war and rural America experienced a severe depression throughout most of the 1920's and even on into the 1930's. One of the major losses for agriculture was due to banks foreclosing farm mortgages because the farmers could no longer pay their mortgages. By the early 1930's, thousands of American farmers were out of businesses. Major businesses, however, had to increase profits through most of the decade although wages remained low and workers were unable to buy the goods they had helped produce. The financial and banking systems were very unregulated and a number of banks had failed during the 1920's. Not only did the Great Depression affect the United States as a whole, there were many different effects on both the North and South.…

    • 3107 Words
    • 13 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    The Agricultural Revolution of the West was significantly affected by the relationship of economic developments and environmental changes between 1865 and 1898. The Homestead Act of 1862 provided many new opportunities for farmers to get an abundance of Western land in an affordable manner. While this was great for many farming families who got suitable land, there was a different opinion from those in the Great Plains. They faced great challenges posed by Mother Nature, especially drought. The droughts brought devastation to the crops, and then to the farmers who couldn’t make enough money. However, the farmers were able to make many adaptations that allowed them to grow crops that survive the harsh conditions. The new development of…

    • 291 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    “We've transformed agriculture into something that needs far less labor and a lot more capital and technology, and a lot of people have been displaced as a result,” says John Cromartie, a population researcher at the USDA. “In a sense, the Great Plains is a victim of its own success, because…

    • 432 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    During the last days of Harrison government the railroads system suffer a major collapsed creating a major panic that impacts the whole nation. Many banks and companies depended on the railroad system and soon the stock market reacted to this. Other countries who had invested started to pull out their funds, leading to a great crisis. The south and the west faced an agricultural crisis and those regions had a chaotic situation. The people were now living in poverty and the monetary issues were heating up.…

    • 170 Words
    • 1 Page
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Dust Bowl Dbq

    • 495 Words
    • 2 Pages

    plains were plowed extensively into wheat fields. At first, the economy was strong, but then in 1929 the stock market crashed. Farmers would move into the plains and plow the soil to plant wheat, leaving only dust to remain. Millions of acres were plowed. The farmers paid no attention to the drought; they just wanted to make cash. They lay idle, ignoring the drought that would bring terror last for eight years. What the farmers didn’t know was that they were cheated. Encouraged by cheap land, the farmers moved onto the Great Plains. Without knowing that the government was using them as a tool, farmers would come into the land and begin planting wheat and selling it, boosting the economy; but then due to the vast amount of producers, the prices would go into an all time low. With families moving into the Great Plains, population was extremely higher. Geoff Cunfer from Southern Minnesota State University states, “The population of the Great Plains – 450 counties stretching from Texas and New Mexico to the Dakotas and Montana – stood at only 800,000 in 1880; it was seven times that, at 5.6 million in 1930.” This caused more people to be affected by the dust storms than ever recorded in…

    • 495 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Best Essays

    Dust Bowl Research Paper

    • 1951 Words
    • 8 Pages

    Hansen, Zeynep K., and Gary D. Libecap. "Small Farms, Externalities, and the Dust Bowl of the 1930s." Journal of Political Economy 112.3 (2004): 665-94. Print.…

    • 1951 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Best Essays
  • Good Essays

    dust bowl

    • 387 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Before the Dust Bowl, The Southeastern Plains was the best place for farmers to go farming and planting. The grass that covered the plains stood six feet high and stretched all the way from Canada south to Texas. People really moved to the midwest certain that they had found the richest soil in the world and the ideal place to settle down. Men began to clear the land — using the endless prairie to grow wheat, and the trees to build houses, barns and outbuildings. During that time, Great Depression and World War I was going around (“United States History”).…

    • 387 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Dust Bowl Essay

    • 733 Words
    • 3 Pages

    People used the wrong agricultural practices when farming. “With insufficient understanding of the ecology of the plains, farmers had conducted extensive deep plowing of the virgin topsoil of the Great Plains during the previous decade; this had displaced the native, deep-rooted grasses that normally trapped soil and moisture even during periods of drought and high winds.” ("Dust Bowl" ). Farmers didn’t know that deep plowing would cause the area to be too airy and it will get picked up by wind. The farmers should not have kept using these technique after seeing it doesnt work. “After the Land Run of 1889, famers changed the landscape that was…

    • 733 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Firstly, one of the challenges Canadians faced during the Great Depression was the disastrous drought in Saskatchewan. Canadians had to face the bitter cold winters and hot dry summers. The land was so dry and had been worked on so many times that the land became very fine. With one gust of wind the soil would blow across the country creating a dust storm. Parts of Saskatchewan and Alberta became to be known as the “Dust Bowl”. (Mennill 14) In 1932, the most damaging grasshopper plague in 50 years hit Manitoba and Saskatchewan. The grasshoppers destroyed the crop fields across the prairies. People could no longer eat the chickens because they began to eat all the grasshoppers and was not safe to eat. (Mennill 15) The farmers would also have to work during the hot dry summers planting seeds. Commonly, the dust storms would blow away the newly planted seed and soil. Farmers were forced to abandon their fields. Roughly 14 000 farms were left behind during the Great Depression. (CBC News) Most of the farmers that left went to Ontario to find work and be able to provide for their families.…

    • 551 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    great depression

    • 840 Words
    • 4 Pages

    Unfortunately the farmers were affected as well on that time because both a drought and horrendous dust storm took place. As a result of them "The Dust Bowl" happened. It was on an area of Oklahoma and other prairie states of the US affected by severe soil erosion in the early 1930s.That left the farmers with no crops. Everyone was losing his job by that time. Herbert Hoover, the president of the United States, was blamed to be the main reason of the Great Depression. But soon, on the next elections, Franklin D. Roosevelt won Hoover's place. Americans had high hopes for Franklin D. Roosevelt. First of all Roosevelt closed all the banks and he only let them reopen when they start being stabilized. He started a new governmental system called "the new deal". Each program in that system has its own initials and it was made for helping a certain type of people or for solving a problem, For example the AAA (Agricultural Adjustment Administration). That was made to help farmers specifically.…

    • 840 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Populist DBQ

    • 402 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Paragraph 1 –problems facing the farmers and the nation: Outside information: Panics, 1873, 1893; high interest on mortgages ; unfair shipping rates charged by railroad companies; lack of government regulation of business practices and public utilities (transportation & communications), Use of the Oz; Use the worksheet; use the handout given you today.…

    • 402 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays