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1 BCE
The Plains Indians
the exact date the Indians arrived on the plains is unknown but it is believed to between 10,000 and 40,000 years ago, meaning they were the first people to move west, long before white people even knew about american or the new world as it was then known. -
The Lewis and Clark Expedition
The first ever expedition westwards in the united states. They returned in September 1806 with maps and a route westwards. -
Mountain men
The mountain men moving west over the Rockies was the first mass migration of white settlers towards the western side of America. They went west to collect animals furs to sell, but they ended up making money as guides, showing people the way through the Rockies. -
The pioneers
In 1841, a wagon train pioneered the 3,200km-long Oregon Trail to the woodland areas of the north-west coast of America. This was the first of hundreds of wagon trains that travelled west. -
The pioneers
1,500 pioneers travelled west in 1844, the same year that some farmers made the journey across the rockies and settled in California. -
The mormons
The first group of Mormon settlers left and headed west along the California Trail. Brigham Young led a group of two children, three women, and 143 men. They left the east as they were seen as a sacrilegious people and were punished by not just the government but by the people, who attacked and often killed mormons. -
The decline of the Oregon trail
because railroads were now peoples first choose of transportation westwards the Oregon trail slipped into decline and by the middle of the 1890's it just wasn't used anymore.
