Indian lands are confiscated by forty-niners in their rush to find gold. Tribal members who retaliate are killed or imprisoned, their children enslaved. By 1860 the Indian population is reduced from 100,000 to 30,000. Historian Elliott West calls th...
Despite its impact on California and life in the United States the gold rush lasts only a short period of time. As California's gold production tapers off other gold and silver discoveries begin to develop in Nevada, Colorado, and other parts of the...
To many 19h century Americans the West is a vast untamed frontier, a place were rugged pioneers are carving out a new social order. In reality the Great Plains of the United States has been a meeting ground for thousands of years, a place of converg...
Inner city neighborhoods are becoming vast repositories for the poor. The city of Chicago with its growing black ghettos is a case in point. For some blacks who are attaining educational opportunities and building powerful black communities in South...