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The Louisiana Purchase
The size of the United States instantly doubled when then-president Thomas Jefferson completed the Louisiana Purchase, buying a massive territory (around 827,000 acres) west of the Mississippi River from the French for $15 million. This transaction included the land that now makes up the states of Louisiana, Arkansas, Iowa, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Oklahoma, and South Dakota. -
Lewis and Clark Expedition
n 1805, President Jefferson sent explorers Meriwether Lewis and Willam Clark, commonly known as Lewis & Clark, to explore the area west of the Mississippi River. In 1806, they returned to where their journey started, then reported the findings of their expedition. -
Seminole War
First Seminole War, conflict between U.S. armed forces and the Seminole Indians of Florida that is generally dated to 1817–18 and that led Spain to cede Florida to the United States. In 1816, U.S. soldiers destroyed a garrison that was a refuge for escaped slaves, killing some 270 people. -
Trail of Tears
Guided by policies favored by President Andrew Jackson, who led the country from 1828 to 1837, the Trail of Tears was the forced westward migration of American Indian tribes from the South and Southeast. Land grabs threatened tribes throughout the South and Southeast in the early 1800s. -
The Great Migration/The Oregon Trail
In 1843, close to 1,000 people joined together to traverse the Oregon Trail via a wagon train, a feat that required going over the treacherous Rocky Mountains. Their approximately 2,000-mile journey was a hardship, but the fact that they survived made many people surprised since they did not think the group would be able to safely navigate the long journey. They settled the area and were followed by thousands more over the next few years. -
Mexican American War
The Mexican-American War was a conflict between the United States and Mexico, fought from April 1846 to February 1848. Won by the Americans and damned by its contemporary critics as expansionist, it resulted in the U.S. gaining more than 500,000 square miles (1,300,000 square km) of Mexican territory extending westward from the Rio Grande to the Pacific Ocean. -
California Gold Rush
Gold was discovered in Northern California, spurring thousands of people to find their way to the west coast in search of riches. The gold rush continued, peaking in 1852 then declining until it ended in 1857. -
California Statehood
California officially became a state in 1850, just two years after being ceded to the United States by Mexico via the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. Unlike other states in the west, California was granted statehood without first having been a territory. -
Homestead Act
With the passing of the Homestead Act of 1862, people were eligible to claim up to 160 acres of land in the west. Approximately 500 million acres were assigned to those who made claims under this law between 1862 and 1904. -
South Dakota Gold Rush
Colonel George Armstrong Custer led an 1874 expedition on which gold was discovered in the Black Hills of the part of the Dakota Territory that is now South Dakota. Within two years, nearly 10,000 people had relocated to the area on a quest for gold.