Dakota Territory
The Dakota Territory was a territory of the United States that existed between 1861 and 1889. The historic territory consisted of the northernmost portion of the Louisiana Purchase , an area that the United States acquired from France in 1803 .
history
Most of the Dakota Territory was originally part of the Minnesota and Nebraska Territories . When Minnesota became a state in 1858, the remaining area east of the Missouri River was reorganized. In the Yankton Treaty , signed in 1859, the Lakota Indian tribe ceded much of their land to the US government. Shortly afterwards, the early settlers formed an unofficial provisional government there and tried unsuccessfully to influence the central government with regard to territorial status.
The Dakota Territory was established on March 2, 1861. At that time it covered large parts of what is now the states of Montana and Wyoming . Starting in 1868, new territories were established that reduced the size of the Dakota Territory to the current borders of the two states of South Dakota and North Dakota .
The capital of the territory was Yankton from 1861 to 1883 . Then she was moved to Bismarck . The Dakota Territory was divided into the two states of North Dakota and South Dakota on November 2, 1889 for several reasons. The two population centers were several hundred miles apart in the northeast and southeast corners of the territory. With a view to the distribution of power in the US Senate , the Republican Party pushed for two states to be admitted rather than one.
Life in the Dakota Territory
After the establishment of the territory, the population grew slowly in the first few years. However, that changed with the Dakota boom between 1870 and 1880. The Sioux Indians were considered to be the main reason for the initially slow population growth. They were thought to be very hostile and a threat to the settlers. After the submission of the Sioux, this hindrance fell away. The later population increase can be attributed to the railroad, particularly the Northern Pacific Railroad . The settlers who came to the Dakota Territory came from other western territories as well as from northern and western Europe , including Norway , Germany , Sweden and Canada .
The economy of the territory was largely shaped by agriculture. The soil in Dakota was fertile and wheat became the main export product. In the 1880s, a drought hit the territory and the price of wheat fell at the same time. Dakota was in dire straits as a result. Also livestock and mining played a role. When gold was found in the Black Hills , more settlers moved to the area. The resulting increase in population promoted livestock farming on Dakota's vast open pastures.
The first city in the Dakota Territory was Medary , founded in 1857, south of what is now Brookings , South Dakota.
Web links
- Collection of Historical Photographs of the Dakota Territory ( Memento of November 7, 2006 in the Internet Archive )
Individual evidence
- ^ A b Howard R. Lamar (Ed.): The New Encyclopedia of the American West. Revised edition. Yale University Press, New Haven CT et al. 1998, ISBN 0-300-07088-8 , p. 282.
- ^ Charles Phillips, Alan Axelrod (Ed.): Encyclopedia of the American West. Volume 3: Mack - San. Macmillan Reference USA et al., New York NY 1996, ISBN 0-02-897498-0 , pp. 1200-1201.
- ↑ John C. Hudson: Migration to an American Frontier. In: Annals of the Association of American Geographers. Vol. 66, No. 2, 1976, ISSN 0004-5608 , pp. 242-265, here pp. 243-244, doi : 10.1111 / j.1467-8306.1976.tb01088.x .