OpenStax
Open Stax: u.s. History: The Westward Spirit
From a chapter on America's expansion westward in a history textbook. This section looks at how Americans felt about westward expansion in the mid-1800s, and ways that the federal government promoted migration. Includes review questions.
Stanford University
Sheg: Document Based History: Reading Like a Historian: Manifest Destiny
[Free Registration/Login Required] Students use primary source documents to investigate central historical questions. In this investigation students use nineteenth-century maps and art, and consider the roots of American exceptionalism.
Curated OER
National Park Service: Adeline Hornbeck and the Homestead Act
This Teaching with Historic Places lesson effectively depicts the life of a pioneer woman and ways in which the Homestead Act impacted her life. The site includes lesson plans, inquiry questions, and photos that may be used in covering...
Digital History
Digital History: Conquering Space
A good review of how the rise of nationalism led to western expansion, support for federal funds to build infrastructure, and the protection of new American industry.
Digital History
Digital History: The Louisiana Purchase
Find out about the serendipitous sale of the whole of the Louisiana Province by Napoleon to the Americans for $15 million dollars.
Digital History
Digital History: Indian Removal
The Indian Removal policy was inhumane and without empathy for the Native Americans who were forced from their lands. Read about the attempts to enforce federal treaties and the final removal of three major tribes from the Southeast.
Independence Hall Association
U.s. History: Gold in California
The gold rush in California accelerated the western migration of thousands of young American men, who streamed into California to find riches. See who else arrived in California and find out what they did. In addition, there is a map...
Ohio State University
Osu History Teaching Institute: Homestead Act of 1862
Through the use of primary sources, 4th graders will understand the main concepts of the Homestead Act and use that information to write a letter to a relative explaining why they moved to Ohio.
PBS
Pbs: New Perspectives on the West
This in-depth resource presents a history of the American West from pre-Columbian times until World War I with profiles, documents, and images. It encourages visitors to link these into patterns of historical meaning for themselves....
Calisphere: University of California Libraries
University of California: Calisphere: Gold Rush Era: Everyday Life and People
A collection of primary source photos from 19th-century California which portray what everyday life was like during the California Gold Rush.
Digital Public Library of America
Dpla: Staking Claims: The Gold Rush in Nineteenth Century America
This exhibition explores the Gold Rush, a group of related gold rushes to Western territories in the second half of the nineteenth century, and its impact on American history and culture.
Curated OER
Etc: Native American Delimitations, 1763 1770
A map of the American colonies and territories west to the Mississippi River between the end of the French and Indian War of 1763 and the beginnings of westward expansion of the trans-Appalachian colony proposed in the Vandalia Project...
Digital History
Digital History: Slavery in a Capitalist World
Read about the discontinued use of slave labor in the Western world in the first half of the 19th century in all but five countries in the Western Hemisphere, most notably, the American South. See why Southern politicians and slave...
Library of Congress
Loc: Billy the Kid: Perspectives on an Outlaw
This lesson relates to the westward movement in the United States in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Students analyze the role that gunfighters played in the settlement of the West and distinguish between their factual...
Other
The Map as History: Europe's Colonial Expanision 1820 1939
European countries began exploring and seeking to dominate the rest of the world during the 15th and 16th centuries, thanks to their ability to control sea routes and to the discovery of the American continent. In the 19th century,...
Kansas Historical Society
Beyond Lewis & Clark: The Army Explores the West
This website looks at military explorers from Lewis and Clark (1804) to George Custer (1874).
Other
Historic Trails: Oregon/california Trails
Find a map of the Oregon Trail and California Trail and click Historical Trails tab to discover the hardships and daily grind of traveling on the Oregon Trail.
Curated OER
Arguments of the Chivalry.
This is a large site from American Treasures covering primary source documents from the early 1800s through the Civil War and on to Western Expansion.
Curated OER
Congressional Scales, a True Balance
This is a large site from American Treasures covering primary source documents from the early 1800s through the Civil War and on to Western Expansion.
Curated OER
Stop Thief!
This is a large site from American Treasures covering primary source documents from the early 1800s through the Civil War and on to Western Expansion.
Curated OER
Educational Technology Clearinghouse: Maps Etc: The New West, 1889 1912
A map of the western United States showing the rapid growth of the New West between 1885 and 1912 during the presidencies from Benjamin Harrison to Howard Taft. The map is color-coded to show the States admitted to the Union before the...
Curated OER
Educational Technology Clearinghouse: Maps Etc: Oregon Controversy, 1792 1846
A map of the Oregon Territory between the time of exploration by George Vancouver (1792) and the Oregon Treaty of 1846. The map is color-coded to show the disputed claims of the British and United States, the Russian American line of...
Curated OER
Etc: Development of the Northwest Territory in Us, 1790 1810
A map of the American Northwest Territory showing the boundary developments in 1790, 1800, and 1810. The upper left map shows the territory acquired by the United States from Britain after the Revolutionary War as established by the...
Curated OER
Wikipedia: National Historic Landmarks in Washington, d.c.: Elliott Coues House
Elliott Coues, a leading 19th century ornithologist, led great expansions of the knowledge of North American bird life, helped found the American Ornithologists' Union in 1883, edited approximately 15 volumes of journals, memoirs, and...