American West Key Terms Frederick Jackson Turner Frederick Jackson Turner November 14 1861 March 14 1932 was an American historian in the early 20th century based at the University of Wisconsin until 1910 and then at Harvard He trained many PhDs who came to occupy prominent places in the history profession He promoted interdisciplinary and quantitative methods often with a focus on the Midwest He is best known for his essay The Significance of the Frontier in American History whose ideas formed the Frontier Thesis He argued that the moving western frontier shaped American democracy and the American character from the colonial era until 1890 He is also known for his theories of geographical sectionalism In recent years historians and academics have argued strenuously over Turner s work all agree that the Frontier Thesis has had an enormous impact on historical scholarship and the American mind The Significance of the Frontier in American History Isohyets a line on a map connecting points having the same amount of rainfall in a given period 98th Meridian marker line of the American West Rain Shadow Effect A rain shadow is a dry area on the lee side of a mountainous area The mountains block the passage of rain producing weather systems and cast a shadow of dryness behind them Regional Characteristics Great Plains a vast prairie region extending from Alberta and Saskatchewan and Manitoba in Canada south through the west central United States into Texas formerly inhabited by Native Americans Great Basin is the largest area of contiguous endorheic watersheds in North America It is noted for both its arid climate and the Basin and range topography that varies from the North American low point at Badwater Basin to the highest point of the contiguous United States less than 100 miles 160 km away at the summit of Mount Whitney The region spans several physiographic divisions biomes Eco regions and deserts Pacific Northwest and California was used at first for fur trading by Russia and Spain After the US took over this land they used it for fur trading and expanding of the US Beringia was the land bridge used to travel over to American from the nomadic tribes that came from Europe Anasazi a member of an ancient American Indian peoples of the southwestern US who flourished between c 200 BC and AD 1500 The earliest phase of their culture typified by pit dwellings is known as the Basket Maker period the present day Pueblo culture developed from a later stage Great Plains Tribes Characteristics Apache a member of a North American Indian people living chiefly in New Mexico and Arizona The Apache put up fierce resistance to the European settlers and were under the leadership of Geronimo the last American Indian people to be conquered Sioux Lakota an indigenous people of the Great Plains of Canada and the United States They are one of the three main subcultures of the Sioux people and are usually divided into the Eastern Dakota and the Western Dakota Comanche a member of an American Indian peoples of the southwestern US The Comanche were among the first to acquire horses from the Spanish and resisted white settlers fiercely The horse and its effects on American Indian tribes before the horse the Indians did not hunt on the plains that much because the prey was too fast for them After the horse was introduced to the Indian almost hunted and used it to extinction They used the horse to travel on and hunt buffalo with this led to the decline of the Indian tribes because they moved away from farming and relied solely on horses to hunt with Cabeza de Vaca was a Spanish explorer of the New World one of four survivors of the 1527 Narv ez expedition During eight years of traveling across the US Southwest he became a slave trader and shaman to various Native American tribes before reconnecting with Spanish colonial forces in Mexico in 1536 After returning to Spain in 1537 he wrote an account first published in 1542 as La Relaci n which in later editions was retitled Naufragios Shipwrecks Was told about the Seven Cities of Cibola and told everyone he knew where these cite were Seven Cities of Cibola were lost cities of vast amounts of gold hidden in an area by an Indian tribe long ago no one knows where these cities are but it was said that Cabeza de Vaca new the location of them Coronado was a Spanish conquistador who visited New Mexico and other parts of what are now the southwestern United States between 1540 and 1542 Coronado had hoped to conquer the mythical Seven Cities of Gold His name is often Anglicized as Vasquez de Coronado Juan de O ate 1550 1626 was a Spanish Conquistador explorer and colonial governor of the Santa Fe de Nuevo M xico province in the Viceroyalty of New Spain He led early Spanish expeditions to the Great Plains and Lower Colorado River Valley encountering numerous indigenous tribes in their homelands there O ate founded settlements within the province and in the present day American Southwest New Mexico the Spanish owned this land before it was taken by the US It was a trade stop for the Santa Fe Trail and was not well supplied by Mexico Because of its rich supplies of gold and silver Spain was resilient to give it up to America but after the war between Mexico and America Spain gave the land to the US along with other states around the area Franciscans are people and groups religious orders who adhere to the teachings and spiritual disciplines of Saint Francis of Assisi The term is usually applied to members who also adhere to the Roman Catholic Church However other denominations also have members who self describe as Franciscan They include Old Catholic Anglican and Lutheran The members that were sent out by the church to colonize places when soldiers were in low supply or the crown could not afford to send soldiers Royal Orders of 1573 was a law setup by the Spanish to try and civilize the Indian tribes around them during this time They would take in the Indian children and school them and in return the children would grow up to civilize the tribes They would school cloth and change everything about the children so they would be more Spanish like so that trading and peace talk could happen with the Spanish and Indian tribes Encomienda was an legal system that was employed mainly by the Spanish crown during the Spanish colonization of the Americas to regulate Native Americans and autonomy In the encomienda the Spanish crown granted a person a specified number of natives for