Short History of Native people of America

1. Chapter 2
Early Americans

2. Word Association
• Tell me what words come to mind when you hear
“Native American”

3. History: Before 1492
• Common myth is that they all crossed the land
bridge from Asia around 12,000 year ago.
• True time period is between 12,000 and 40,000
years ago.
• Many came by boat

5. History: Before 1492
• Soon Native Americans created some of the most
amazing, awe inspiring, and advanced cultures in the
entire world.
• Population estimates before European contact
estimated by the majority of experts range from
50-100 million
• It is estimated that in Central America alone there
were 25 million people living before European
contact!

6. History: Before 1492
• These population estimates mean that there were
more people living in the Americas than in all of
Europe at the same time!
• It also tells us that Central America was the most
populated region in the world!

7. Before 1492
• Native Americans lived in small towns and villages
spread out over an area. This area would compose
of the tribes people. In some tribes this area would
be 1000’s of miles and encompass 100’s of thousands
of people

8. Paleo-Indians
• Archaeologists call the
time just after people
first came to North
America the Paleo-
Indian period.
• They hunted Mammoth
• They dealt with Saber-
toothed cats and other
nasty predators that are
now extinct.

9. Paleo-Indians

10. Paleo Indians
• Paleo Indians did not
have bow and arrows.
They hunted with a
Spear that had a stone
point. This Spear Point
is called a Clovis Point.

11. Clovis Points
• Clovis: 13,500 year old
archeological site found
in Clovis, New Mexico
where first Clovis Point
found
• Clovis points found
everywhere including
PA and NY

12. Clovis Point vs Head

13. History: Before 1492
• Large societies and huge cities were not just in the
Native cultures of the Aztec, Maya, and Inca. In
North America there were huge cities and complex
societies.
• The ancient Mississippian city of Cahokia was
located near modern day St. Louis, Missouri.
• It stretched for 5 miles and had Pyramids
bigger than the Great Pyramids of Giza in
Egypt.
• It had a population of 15,000 which made it
the largest city North of the Rio Grande.

15. History: Before 1492
• The Cultures of North America had complex trade
relations and monetary systems.
• Shell Beads from Florida, Obsidian from the Rocky
Mountains, and mica from Tennessee, all found there
way to the North East.
• Mother -of-Pearl from the Gulf of Mexico found its
way to Manitoba, and Lake Superior copper found its
way to Louisiana.

16. History: Before 1492
• Native Americans had the most complex system of
agriculture in the entire world.
• They were able to cultivate the land heavily without
having a deep impact on it.
• Many of the first explorers of the Americas wrote of
the miles and miles of maze fields.

17. History: Before 1492
• Native Americans had a huge impact on animal
populations
• Native Americans kept animal populations in check.
• Ex: There were more Bison on the continent
immediately after European settlement than before
they came due to the effects of disease and war on
Native American population.

18. History: Before 1492
• Almost 400 years before European contact the
Iroquois nation had developed one of the first
representative governments.
• The government was devised of 5 separate nations
and was highlighted by its written constitution, equal
rights, and checks and balances on powers.
• Sound familiar?

19. 1492:The Truth about Columbus
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v
=2wm0EvTk8o4
• Facts:
• 1. Columbus did not discover
America
2. Columbus was a slave trader
for the East Indian trade
Company
3. Columbus enslaved the Taino
or Arawak natives
4. Columbus’s actions directly
resulted in the death of
thousands and perhaps millions of
Arawak Indians.
5. Columbus was not the first
explorer in America

20. European Exploring Explosion
• Over the next 100 years Europe sent hundreds of
explorers to not only explore the American
continent, but more importantly CLAIM the land
already settled by the natives for their European
homeland.
• http://epe.lac-bac.gc.ca/100/206/301/lac-bac/passages-ef/pa
• http://www.lib.utexas.edu/maps/united_states/exploration
• http://www.lib.utexas.edu/maps/united_states/exploration

21. Consequences of Exploration
• Each expedition spelled catastrophe for the Native
Americans
• Each expedition was accompanied by a large
population of pigs in order to feed the explorers.
• These pigs traveled freely and spread disease to the
natives and their sources of foods such as deer and
other game.
• It is estimated that the native population in some
areas were reduced by 98% before any permanent
European settlement was even established.

23. Consequences of Exploration
• Many later settlers would remark on Indian ghost
towns or how the shores were full of bleached
Indian bones.
• With a total loss of Native population in some areas
fields were unmanaged and grown over, animal
populations grew out of control(Bison, Carrier
Pigeon), children were left orphaned.
• European settlers saw this as a gift from god and
took over empty Indian villages. (Plymouth)

25. Broken Promises
• After helping the English survive at Jamestown and
Plymouth the Native American tribes along the New
England coast signed several peace treaties with the
English and looked to live peacefully with their new
allies.
• Meanwhile disease continued to ravage the Natives
• These treaties would soon be ignored as the English
colonist continued to push more into the interior.

26. Attitudes Change
• As anger and racism grew among the English colonist
near the Massachusetts Bay Colony, a war broke out
with the peaceful tribe called the Pequots.
• This would be the first major war which would mark
the beginning of the Indian Wars, the longest running
conflict in American History.

27. The Pequot War
• Beginning in 1636 this short war would culminate in
the almost comlete eradication of the Pequot tribe.
• The war was characterized by the Mystic River
Massacre. The massacre ended the war and ended
the Pequots as a tribe
• The Mystic River Massacre happened when a small
strike force of colonial militia surrounded a Pequot
village and set it on fire.
• As the men woman and children fled the burning
village they were shot down. In all close to 700
Pequots died in the massacre.

29. War
• http://www.legendsofamerica.com/na-indianwartimeline.ht

30. The French and Indian War
• Over 100 years after the Pequot War the native
Americans were still signing false treaties and
attempting to deal with the influx of colonizers unto
their homeland.
• Unlike the British and Spanish, the French did not
attempt to colonize America. They simply set up
Fur trading areas with the natives.
• The French and Indian war was costly for the natives
because it split many of the tribes.
• The French lost and the British felt the native
territory was now open for settlement

31. The Proclamation of 1763
• To try and ease Native American and colonist’
relations King George enacted the Proclamation of
1763. It stated the colonist could not settle the land
west of the Appalachian mountains. This land was
considered Indian land.
• This angered the colonist greatly and was one of the
leading causes of the American Revolution.

33. The American Revolution
• The American Revolution further split the Native
American nation and was devastating to the
Iroquois( Haudenosaunee) Nation .
The Expedition you are appointed to command is to be directed against the hostile
tribes of the Six Nations of Indians, with their associates and adherents. The
immediate objects are the total destruction and devastation of their settlements,
and the capture of as many prisoners of every age and sex as possible. It will be
essential to ruin their crops now in the ground and prevent their planting more.
I would recommend, that some post in the center of the Indian Country, should
be occupied with all expedition, with a sufficient quantity of provisions whence
parties should be detached to lay waste all the settlements around, with
instructions to do it in the most effectual manner, that the country may not be
merely overrun, but destroyed.
Orders of George Washington
to General John Sullivan
At Head-Quarters
May 31, 1779

34. The American Revolution
• When your army entered the country of the Six
Nations, we called you Town Destroyer: and to this
day when that name is heard our women look
behind them and turn pale, and our children cling
close to the necks of their mothers. Our counsellors
and warriors are men, and cannot be afraid; but their
hearts are grieved with the fears of our women and
children, and desire that it may be buried so deep as
to be heard no more.
• Seneca Chief Cornplanter
To George Washington
1790

35. Probably more like this

36. HTTP://SULLIVANCLINTON.COM

37. The Consequences
• The American revolution was devastating to Native
Americans.
• It united colonists and eliminated any voice to
oppose colonial encroachment on Native American
lands.
• What was to follow was a new organized program
designed to deal with the “Indian Question”

38. The “Indian Question”

39. Assimilation
• Native American children were taken from their
families and sent to boarding schools where they
were forced to let go and change who they were.
• They were often abused severely and ridiculed for
being different.
• The natives were expected to stop practicing their
religion and convert to Christianity.
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v
=qDshQTBh5d4&feature=related

40. Removal
• Indians were forced to move from their ancestral
homes and go westward onto reservations.
• These reservations were often placed in poor areas
unsuitable for growing traditional crops.
• If the natives were like the Apache and did not
practice traditional farming they now had no other
choice since they were unable to travel and hunt
game.
• Removal was first proposed by Jefferson and
attempted by Madison.
• It was not until Andrew Jackson ignored the
Supreme Court that removal actually happened

41. Removal
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PiVXJSXlptY
• Commissioner of Indian Affairs Luke Lea set forth
the doctrine in 1851 by calling for the Indians'
"concentration, their domestication, and their
incorporation."
• The Indian Office promoted these objectives by breaking up the "habits of
savage life" by instilling "civilized" values through forced education, by
insisting on agricultural labor, and by pushing the notion of private
property and the development of monetary funds. To this end, the
reservation was conceived as a controlled society where the habits of
civilization could be molded under the direction of the Indian agent and
agency personnel. From 1880 to 1934, ethnocide became an officially
sanctioned policy.

42. Annihilation
• Sand Creek Massacre
• Wounded Knee Massacre
• Hundreds of other examples
• "I did not know how much was ended. When I look
back now from this high hill of my old age, I can see
the butchered women and children lying heaped and
scattered all along the crooked gulch as plain as I saw
them with eyes still young. And I can see that
something else died there in the bloody mud, and was
buried in the blizzard. A people's dream died there. It
was a beautiful dream...”
Black Elk, Oglala Holy Man ...on the aftermath of the
Massacre at Wounded Knee

43. Fighting for Their Right to Survive
• Native Americans today as in the past are continually
fighting for their rights. And gain awareness of the
latent racism and genocide they have has to endure
for the last 500 years.
• A.I.M
http://www.aimovement.org/

44. Native Americans Today
• Most of the Native Americans today live on
reservations.
• These reservations are often the poorest places in
the United States
• 3 million Native Americans in 2004.
• 1 million living on Reservations
• The majority live in Urban areas throughout United
States
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v
=dq0Joi1ELps&feature=fvw

45. Seneca

46. Arapahoe

47. Cherokee

48. Apache

49. Sioux

50. Cultural Contributions

51. So How Do I Teach About This
• http://
www.besthistorysites.net/USHistory_NativeAmerican.sht
• http://edsitement.neh.gov/view_lesson_plan.asp?id
=347
• http://www.teach-nology.com/teachers/lesson_plans/histo

52. Questions & Answers
• Thank you for your time

53. Portrayal in the Media
• http://
www.youtube.com/watch?v
=_hJFi7SRH7Q&feature=related
• "Take the Tribe and Scalp 'Em."