Following the Railroad: How the Iron Horse Changed the American Landscape
Written by Cheryl C. Malandrinos
Indian Country
In Donald
Zochert’s biography titled Laura, he tells of a visit Charles Ingalls
received from his sister Docia. Her husband, Hiriam was working for the
railroad and Docia asked if Charles would be interested in moving to
Dakota Territory to work with him. Even though his wife, Caroline was
reluctant to leave Walnut Grove, she agreed to go.
The family settled into the Silver Lake Camp in 1879. According to William
Anderson’s book The Story of the Ingalls, Charles performed clerical work
for the railroad. During the winter, his family stayed in the Surveyor’s
House and Charles traveled to Brookings in early 1880 to take a homestead,
which would become the Ingalls farm. Charles had also been purchasing town
lots in De Smet and in the fall of 1887 Charles, Caroline, Carrie and
Grace settled permanently in De Smet, making it — as promised to his wife
— their last move. Mary was away from home during this time, studying at
the Iowa College for the Blind.
The railroad played a substantial role in the events that unfolded for the
Ingalls family in the late 1800’s. Towns like Brookings and De Smet popped
up across the country as the railroad worked feverishly to connect the
East and West Coasts. Let’s take a look at how the railroad changed the
American landscape.
There were many obstacles to building a transcontinental railroad —
financing, selecting the most practical and economical routes, and the
Civil War to name a few. But perhaps the greatest challenge to connecting
the East and the West was Indian Country. This part of the United States
was the only portion left unorganized after the Compromise of 1850. Indian
Country ran from Texas to Canada and from the Missouri border to the
Rockies. And it was obvious the U.S. Government intended to remove this
obstacle to make way for the railroad.
In March of 1853, Congress authorized surveys to find which was the “most
practical and economical route for a railroad from the Mississippi River
to the Pacific Ocean.” And in August of the same year, President Franklin
Pierce sent the Commissioner of Indian Affairs, George Maypenny to Indian
Country to see if the tribes would agree to a territorial government which
would relinquish their title to some or all of the land. Interestingly
enough, Maypenny did not visit with the tribes located in the areas that
were favored for the transcontinental railroad routes. Instead he spoke to
the Omaha who resided between the Missouri and the Platte; and then moved
south to speak with the Oto and Missouri, the Sauk and Fox, the Kickapoo,
and the Delawares who were north of the Kansas River. Most of these tribes
had been pushed across the Mississippi a few years earlier and were
promised by the White Father that these new lands would be theirs “as long
as the grass shall grow or the waters run.”
Most of the tribes signed the treaties Maypenny offered them, but about
half of the nations refused to acquiesce to the pressure from the U.S.
Government and instead accepted reduced reserves. Maypenny sometimes
accepted partial cessions when tribes were especially stubborn. He also
agreed that the ceded lands would be “administered by the United States in
trust for the ceding nations; that the acres should be sold at public sale
to the highest bidder and that they should not be offered at the usual
minimum price of $1.25 until after the lapse of three years.”
Senator Stephen A. Douglas of Illinois had a strong interest in the
transcontinental railroad and he wanted the route to run through Chicago,
which he saw as a great economic advantage for his State and home town.
But this meant the railroad would have to run through Indian Country. To
solve the problem, Douglas introduced a bill in January of 1854, calling
for the organization of a huge new territory, known as Nebraska — west of
Iowa and Missouri — which would open this portion of the country up to
white settlement.
As Douglas suspected, the South opposed the bill because it made way for
another free state. This new territory would be north of the Missouri
Compromise line and therefore, closed to slavery. But Douglas added a
provision to the bill stating that whether Nebraska was free or slave
would be decided by the territorial legislature – a policy known as
popular sovereignty. But Southern Democrats wanted more, so Douglas wrote
an additional clause which withdrew the antislavery provision of the
Missouri Compromise and also created two territories out of the area —
Kansas and Nebraska. Few believed Nebraska would be open to slavery, but
by having two territories instead of one, there was still hope that Kansas
would become a slave state. The final draft of the Kansas-Nebraska Act was
signed into law in May 1854 with the full support of the South and partial
support from the Northern Democrats. The only portion of Indian Country
left untouched was the section between Texas and the thirty-seventh
parallel.
White settlement into the territories of Kansas and Nebraska was slow, and
when the decade ended, only 107,206 people resided in Kansas and in
Nebraska there were a scant 28,841. The Kansas-Nebraska Act did not put an
end to the slavery question, nor did it promote emigration. But it was
successful in removing the obstacle created by Indian Country. It seemed a
railroad to the Pacific was inevitable.
This article copyright © 2006 Cheryl C. Malandrinos and may not be
reproduced in any form without the express written consent of its author.
All rights reserved.
Sources:
Donald Zochert,
Laura (New York: Avon Books, Inc., 1976), pp. 130 – 131.
William Anderson, The Story of the Ingalls (The Laura Ingalls Wilder
Family Series) (Anderson Publications, 1971), pp. 10 – 11, 14 – 15.
Frederic L. Paxson, History of the American Frontier (Georgia: Norman S.
Berg, Publisher, 1924) p. 433.
Marieke van Ophem, “The Iron Horse: the impact of the railroads on 19th
century American society” March 2003. 17 April 2006.
http://www.let.rug.nl/usa/E/ironhorse/ironhorsexx.htm
Frederic L. Paxson, History of the American Frontier (Georgia: Norman S.
Berg, Publisher, 1924) p. 432.
Marieke van Ophem, “The Iron Horse: the impact of the railroads on 19th
century American society” March 2003. 17 April 2006.
http://www.let.rug.nl/usa/E/ironhorse/ironhorsexx.htm
Frederic L. Paxson, History of the American Frontier (Georgia: Norman S.
Berg, Publisher, 1924) p. 432.
Marieke van Ophem, “The Iron Horse: the impact of the railroads on 19th
century American society” March 2003. 17 April 2006.
http://www.let.rug.nl/usa/E/ironhorse/ironhorsexx.htm
Marieke van Ophem, “The Iron Horse: the impact of the railroads on 19th
century American society” March 2003. 17 April 2006.
http://www.let.rug.nl/usa/E/ironhorse/ironhorsexx.htm
Marieke van Ophem, “The Iron Horse: the impact of the railroads on 19th
century American society” March 2003. 17 April 2006.
http://www.let.rug.nl/usa/E/ironhorse/ironhorsexx.htm
Frederic L. Paxson, History of the American Frontier (Georgia: Norman S.
Berg, Publisher, 1924) p. 435.
Frederic L. Paxson, History of the American Frontier (Georgia: Norman S.
Berg, Publisher, 1924) p. 436.
