Collection

Public Land & Westward Expansion

Annotated bibliography for paper project in progress.

created by Kathryn Ostrofsky on January 1, 2024

partner

Land Acquisition and Dispossession: Mapping the Homestead Act, 1863-1912

Year-by-year maps of homesteading claims and the dispossession of Native Americans.

by Robert K. Nelson, Justin Madron, Julius Wilm via American Panorama on January 18, 2022

1860s: Western Nebraska & Kansas declared "public land" which opened them to homesteaders... Play with this section of the interactive map & do more research into Medicine Lodge Treaty (1867) & how designation of public land was actually used to privatize land...

Sign advertising land for sale, near sign marking entrance to Mojave National Preserve.

The American West’s Great Checkerboard Problem

As long as the U.S. system privileges private property, thousands of acres of public lands will remain off limits.

by Julia Sizek via Zócalo Public Square on August 8, 2023

1880s: The cash-strapped government financed RAILROADS by giving them public land. Resulted in pattern of westward expansion in which remaining public land is still in inaccessible patchwork.

A cowboy on a horse surrounded by grazing cows on open grassland.

A Short Political-Economic History of Property Rights in the American West

How the Tragedy of the Commons theory played out in reality.

by Mathias Bühler via Broadstreet on September 10, 2021

1920s-30s: This one talks about federal economic policy AFTER westward expansion, that deals with the 20th century effects.

An 1886 illustration of a cowboy and cow camp.

When Texas Cowboys Fought Private Property

When cattle barons carved up Texas with barbed wire in the late 19th century, cowboys formed fence-cutting gangs to preserve the open range.

by David Griscom via Jacobin on October 4, 2022

Read this piece - see how RANCHING & enclosure fits into this.

Motorcycle vest embroidered with the words "Sagebrush Rebel."

Legacies of the Sagebrush Rebellion

A conversation about the roots of organized resistance to federal regulation of public lands in the American West.

by Robert Lundberg, Alexandra Lakind, Jonathan P. Thompson via Edge Effects on November 10, 2020

Read this - re more legacies: American Indian RESISTANCE, 21st century. People dispossessed of "public" lands that are now controlled by feds so they can't use them. [do more research: who is the public when we say "public lands"?]