Marvels of North America Grand Canyon : The Grand Canyon is a steep-sided canyon carved by the Colorado River in the United States in the state of Arizona. It is contained within and managed by Grand Canyon National Park, the Hualapai Tribal Nation, and the Havasupai Tribe. It is considered one of the Seven Natural Wonders of the World. The Grand Canyon is 277 miles (446 km) long, up to 18 miles (29 km) wide and attains a depth of over a mile (6,000 feet / 1,800 metres). Nearly two billion years of the Earth's geological history have been exposed as the Colorado River and its tributaries cut their channels through layer after layer of rock while the Colorado Plateau was uplifted.
Colorado History There had always been rumors of gold in the Rocky Mountains since the 16th Century but the Pike’s Peak gold Rush of 1859 was a very instantaneous. It took hundreds of years of building and creating land into just a couple of years. Word spread quickly throughout towns close to Colorado, making miners, merchants, barkeepers, hardware dealers, editors, land sharks, and politicians leave their homes and jobs believing they would hit it big. In 1807 Zebulon Pike met a man named James Purcell who had claimed to find gold in what is now Pike’s Peak, and others claimed it to be in present day Arvada. On June 4 through July 4 a party of more than one hundred men led by William Green Russell (Russell Party) set out to follow
A town born in a mining boom at Pikes Peak in 1858, Denver was to become an unlikely thriving metropolis by the end of the nineteenth century. What now is the capital and largest city in Colorado had the humblest of origins. General William Larimer, a land speculator from eastern Kansas, hadn’t the slightest idea of the chain reaction he put into motion when he discovered gold along the South Platte River. The Pikes Peak Gold Rush brought thousands to Colorado for instant riches. Although, scattered camps of miners settled throughout the Rockies and did not congregate in a high concentration in any particular area.
The town contained a variety of gold mines with the Alaska-Juneau, or A-J, mine the most successful. The A-J mine buildings are still visible above town. Other gold mines include the Treadwill Mine complex at Douglas and the Alaska-Gastineau mine south of town. A massive cave-in occurred at Treadwill in 1917 and the mine closed. When gold content dropped below profitable margins in 1921, the Alaska-Gastineau mine closed.
SPINDLETOP OILFIELD. The Spindletop oilfield, discovered on a salt dome formation south of Beaumont in eastern Jefferson County on January 10, 1901, marked the birth of the modern petroleum industry. The Gladys City Oil, Gas, and Manufacturing Company, formed in August 1892 by George W. O'Brien, George W. Carroll, Pattillo Higgins, Emma E. John, and J. F. Lanier, was the first company to drill on Spindletop Hill. Three shallow attempts, beginning in 1893 and using cable-tool drilling equipment were unsuccessful; Lanier and Higgins had left the company by 1895. Anthony F. Lucas, the leading United States expert on salt dome formations, made a lease with the Gladys City Company in 1899.
During the fast-paced modernization of the 1920s, Hoover played an active role in organizing the fledgling radio broadcasting and civilian aviation industries, and also laid the groundwork for the construction of a huge dam on the Colorado River between Arizona and Nevada. election of 1928, Hoover ran as the Republican Party’s nominee. He carried 40 states and defeated Democratic candidate Alfred E. Smith (1873-1944), the governor of New York, by a record margin of 444-87 electoral
Chapter 16 The Conquest of the Far West Pioneers such as farmers, ranchers, and miners settled west around 1845 and recreated the image of “The Great American Desert” to a legendary “Frontier.” Many Americans were in the west before the Civil War. Despite efforts to drive away established native populations, the Anglo-Americans found themselves among them with their influence in everything they did. Pioneers really relied on federal money and the capitalism of the East. The Far West or “Great West” was more than just one region beyond the Mississippi River; it was filled with many people and different environments. The most widespread Indian group of the West was the Plains Indians.
George Machado Professor Tota English 1101 23 February 2011 Perfection in Boulder The settlement of Colorado was spawned by the lure of gold, due to an economic depression in the eastern United States during the 1850's. In the early years of Boulder City, mining played an extremely important role in Boulder's development. It continued to bring settlers into the area who were both involved in mining itself and in supporting facilities, such as hardware and mining supply stores, transport businesses, room and board houses, and gambling and drinking establishments. As years progressed, Colorado soon developed a strong agricultural industry and people friendly environment. Boulder has won just about every shiny happy lifestyle award a city
YELLOW STONE NATIONAL PARK Yellow Stone National Park is located in Wyoming, although it extends into Montana and Idaho. March 1st, 1872 president Ulysses S. Grant established and signed Yellow Stone into a law. It was known to be the first national park in the world, for old faithful geyser and wildlife. For at least 11,000 years native Americans have lived in the Yellow Stone region. During the Lewis and Clark expedition in the early 19th century was bypassed.
Mexicans have lived in the Pacific Northwest since the 1850s. They continued to come to the region for mining and ranching opportunities through the latter half of the nineteenth century. In the first two decades of the twentieth century, political and economic conditions in Mexico that resulted from revolution and the repressive policies of President Porfirio Diaz pushed many out of Mexico to go north. Agricultural and railroad expansion and labor shortages in the United States also pulled thousands of Mexicans from their homeland to the Southwest and to other regions of the United States. Mexican American communities in the Columbia River Basin began to grow dramatically beginning in the early 1940s.