| A | B |
|---|
| Push-Pull | Events & conditions that either force people to move elsewhere or strongly attract them to do so |
| Morrill Land Grant Act | Passed by congress in 1862 this law distributed millions of acres of western lands to state government in order to fund state agricultural colleges |
| Land speculators | Person who buys up large areas of land in the hope of selling them later for a profit |
| Homestead Act | 1862 law that gave 160 acres of land to citizens who met certain conditions |
| Exoduster | an African American who migrate to the west after the Civil War |
| Great Plains | Vast grassland between the Mississippi River and the Rocky Mountains |
| Nomadic | people who move their homes regularly usually in search of available food sources |
| Reservation | The social and economic transition from wartime to peacetime |
| Battle of Little Big Horn | 1876 Sioux victory over army troops led by George Custer |
| Ghost Dance | a Native American purification ritual |
| Massacre at Wounded Knee | 1890 shooting of a group of unarmed Sioux by army troops |
| Assimilation | process by which people of one culture merge into and become part of another culture |
| Dawes Act | 1887 law that divided reservation land into private family plots |
| Boomers | settlers who ran in land races to claim upon the 1889 opening of Indian Territory for settlement |
| Sooners | in 1889 people who illegally claimed land by snaking past government officials before the land races began |
| Placer mining | a mining technique in which miners shoveled loose dirt into boxes and then ran water over the dirt to separate it from gold or silver particles |
| Homesteader | one who farmed claims under the Homestead Act |
| Soddie | a home whose walls and roof are made from blocks of grass with the thick roots and earth attached |
| Dry farming | techniques to raise crops in areas that receive little rain |
| Bonanza farms | farm controlled by large businesses |
| Money supply | the amount of money in the national economy |
| Deflation | a drop in the prices of goods |
| Interstate Commerce Act | 1887 law passed to regulate railroad and other interstate businesses |
| Populist | follower of the people party formed in 1891 to advocate a large money supply and other economic reforms |
