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American West: conflict, settlement + industry - Coggle Diagram

- - - - Pacific Railroad Act
        
        Gov. needed to connect east + west coat to enable troop movement, let federal law officers reach settlements, promote western settlement (Manifest Destiny) + transport goods to ports eg. in Oregon and California
        
        Gov. support: $61 million in loans ($16,000 per mile but $48,000 for mountains), 45 million acres of free land for railroad companies to sell, + treaties with natives to move them away
      - Southern states blocked proposed rout (Omaha --> Sacramento) so act passed after they left Union in 1861 to form Confederacy: Pacific Railroad Act passed in 1862 + granted job to Union Pacific and Central Pacific
      - Impact: railroad companies sold plots en-route and set up railhead towns, railroad "Bureaus of Immigration" sent agents to Europe to persuade immigrants to come west
      - Completed 1869 at Promontary Point: 1st transcontintal railroad
  - - - Fort Bridger ~ 81 tried to take short cut from guide book + 4 wagons broke, 300 cattle died - arrived at Sierra Nevada late and found Jan. 1847 by rescue teams (45/81 survived and one man had killed another)
  - - - Joseph Smith founded "Church of the Latter Day Saints" - claimed he dug up + translated 2 gold plated into 1830 Book of Mormon
      - New York 1823 - 1831: left due to hostility from "gentiles" ~ Mormons believed superiority
      - Kirtland, Ohio 1831 - 1837: left due to 1837 economic collapse making people lose savings from Smith's bank + jealousy of success
      - Independence, Missouri 1837 - 1838: left as Missouri a slave state + Mormons encouraged native cooperation
      - Nauvoos, Illinois 1838 - 1846: left after Joseph Smith declared polygamy beliefs (declared "dictator" after destroying printing press) then ran for presidency = killed by mob in 1844 in jail
    - - Brigham Young splint 1,500 Mormons into groups. Tactics: skilled groups, arranging wagons in circles at night, prioritising rest + discipline, + 1847 advance party (planning route, finding good water/grass spots, setting up quarters + improving trail) along parts of Donner's route
        
        Between 1847 - 1869, 70,000 Mormons used the Mormon Trail. The Mormon Church owned all land, water + timber (allocated to families), dug irrigation ditches - Perpetual Emigration Fund provided resources for worldwide Mormons --> Utah