Gilded Age Homesteaders: government offered free land (Homestead Act of 1862) railroad companies offered land building a railroad gave you everything led to people buying up land Frederick Jackson Turner?s thesis broke down class distinctions, promoted independence 1890 census - no more land in the West As more people move West, what happens to Native Americans? miners and railroad companies pressured natives to give up land :( The Native ?Wars? Originally, the plan was just to move the natives west of the Mississippi Ft. Laramie Treaty example of treaties that were signed giving land to natives that whites would stay off of Pike?s Peak gold rush (1859) ? more people West 1868 - Sioux (leader - Sitting Bull) Gold was discovered; miners come in huge amounts