U.S. History On-line Syllabus

Ms. Wilford

Subject: Using the textbook web site for extra credit>

Extra-credit points may be earned for each chapter by using the links provided by the textbook web site to do additional readings over chapter topics and answering the questions below linked with these readings. Students should write or type out the questions and the answers and submit them for extra credit before the chapter test.

(For some chapters, computer lab time will be scheduled for the entire class and questions will be assigned for homework credit instead of extra credit.)

Text for U.S. History: The Americans McDougal-Littell

Web site address for textbook links: http://www.classzone.com/

Chapter 7: 1817-1840—Balancing Nationalism and Sectionalism

Extra credit questions for chapter 7:

1. His invention brought prosperity to the South, but no wealth for himself due to patent infringements. Who was he and what did he invent? How did this invention contribute to increasing sectionalism in the United States?
2. How did Henry Clay earn his reputation as "The Great Compromiser"?
3. Why was John Tyler dubbed "His Accidency"?
4. If George W. Bush becomes President in the next election, it will be the 2^nd time in U.S. history that the son of a president became President. Who was the first to do so, and why was his election controversial?
5. Who said, "Our Federal Union: it must be preserved."?
6. Why was Andrew Jackson often referred to by opponents as "King Andrew"?
7. Decrying officeholders who seemed to enjoy life tenure, he believed government duties could be "so plain and simple" that offices should rotate among deserving applicants. Who was he?
8. He is one of the lesser known presidents because he is one of the least influential presidents in our history. He is not well known for any particular crisis other than the depression. Who was he and what was this depression called?
9. This Indian tribe was recognized as one of the most progressive among American Indian tribes, having a written constitution and formal government, printing presses producing books and newspapers their native language, and homes often times more luxurious than those of neighboring whites?
10. What did the slogan "Tippecanoe and Tyler Too" imply, and to whom did it refer?

Chapter 8: 1820-1850—Reforming American Society

Extra credit questions for chapter 8:

1. This flamboyant evangelist of the Second Great Awakening, served as the second President of Oberlin College. For nearly a decade, from 1824 to 1833 ,he conducted unusual revivals in the Middle and Eastern states. He believed in individual accountability for one’s personal salvation. Who was he?
2. This philosophy felt that the spark of divinity lies within man. This belief in the Inner Light led to an emphasis of the authority of the Self--to Walt Whitman's I , to the Emersonian doctrine of Self-Reliance, to Thoreau's civil disobedience, and to the Utopian communities at Brook Farm. By meditation, by communing with nature, through work and art, man could transcend his senses and attain an understanding of beauty and goodness and truth. What was this philosophy called?
3. The transcendentalists were influenced by romanticism, especially such aspects as self-examination, celebration of individualism, and extolling the beauties of nature an humankind. What is romanticism?
4. She worked unremittingly for women's movement in all its phases, including divorce reform, birth control, the challenge to religious assumptions which opposed legal rights for women. At the same time, she managed a household of seven children. Who was she?
5. To which famous abolitionist are the following remarks attributed? "That little man in black there! He says women can't have as much rights as men. ‘Cause Christ wasn't a woman. Where did your Christ come from? Where did your Christ come from? From God and a Woman! Man had nothing to do with him! If the first woman God ever made was strong enough to turn the world upside down all alone, these women together ought to be able to turn it back and get it right-side up again. And now that they are asking to do it the men better let them."?
6. What was the first line of the Seneca Falls Declaration and what historic document was it modeled after?
7. In 1848, he attended the Seneca Falls Convention on Women’s Rights. In 1858, he escaped to Canada to avoid being arrested as an accomplice in John Brown's plan to seize Harper's Ferry. In 1872, he was nominated for vice-president by Equal Rights Party on a ticket headed by Victoria Woodhull. He was a noted speaker for women’s rights and abolition. Who was he?
8. The invention of the steam engine and the growing use of water power to operate machinery were developing a trend toward a factory system not much different from that in England which produced misery and slums for decades. What did that lead to the formation of in 1834?
9. How did the Panic of 1837 effect the National Trades Union?
10. Name 3 labor issues of the 1830’s and 40’s.

 

Chapter 9: 1825-1850--Expanding Markets and Moving West

Extra credit questions for chapter 9:

1. Cyrus Hall McCormick invented the mechanical reaper. How did this change the farm economy?
2. Samuel F. B. Morse, inventor of the telegraph, was also noted for creating what? What did the first message sent by telegraph say?
3. What is the connection between Charles Goodyear and the Goodyear Company, and why did he die in poverty?
4. In the 1840s, the cost to move a family of four across the Oregon Trail was approximately...?
5. The average wagon train consisted of how many wagons?
6. How did a cow start a war on the Oregon Trail?
7. Who is John L. O’Sullivan?
8. What was the Bear Flag Revolt?
9. What is James K. Polk’s connection to "Manifest Destiny"?
10. What was the legacy of the gold rush for California?

Chapter 10: 1850-1861--The Union in Peril

Extra credit questions for chapter 10:

1. Who said, "I would rather be right than be President." ?
2. What does Albert Kertesz write home about in his 3^rd letter?
3. What happened between Frederick Douglass and John Brown?
4. Who were the Know Nothings and why were they against immigration and Roman Catholics?
5. Who were the Barnburners?
6. Which two things would Lincoln not want you to know?
7. What war did Lincoln serve in?
8. Where, when and why did Lincoln say these words,".. that the nation would become either all slave or all free: "A house divided against itself cannot stand."
9. What were the names of the nine the conspirators found guilty of plotting Lincoln’s assassination?
10. What important event happened on May 26, 1854, which re-awakened Lincoln's interest in politics?

Chapter 11: 1861-1865--The Civil War

Extra credit questions for chapter 11:

1. What does the preamble of the Confederate Constitution say?
2. What happened at the Lawrence Massacre?
3. Who said, "..but one of them would make war rather than let the nation survive, and the other would accept war rather than let it perish, and the war came."
4. Among her accomplishments was the secret message she sent to General Pierre G.T. Beauregard which ultimately caused him to win the battle of Bull Run. She spied so successfully for the Confederacy that Jefferson Davis credited her with winning the battle of Manassas. Who was she?
5. What happened to Carrie Berry’s family during the war? How did she spend her 10^th birthday?
6. Who invited Lincoln to Gettysburg? What does the opening sentence of the invitation say?
7. "The slave children of Aaron Anthony's were fed cornmeal mush that was placed in a trough, to which they were called. The children made homemade spoons from oyster shells to eat with and competed with each other for every last bite of food. The only clothing that they were provided with was one linen shirt which hung to their knees. The children were provided no beds or warm blankets." Who was Aaron Anthony?
8. Why did John Wilkes Booth assassinate Abraham Lincoln?
9. Miss Barton volunteered for the IRC while on a trip to Europe in 1870. What does IRC stand for? What did she do next?
10. In August 1862,he shocked America by displaying his photographs of battlefield corpses from Antietam, posting a sign on the door of his New York gallery that read, "The Dead of Antietam." Who was he? Why was his work significant?

Chapter 12: 1865-1877—Reconstruction and Its Effects

Extra credit questions for chapter 12:

1. What is reconstruction?
2. Choose 3 of the slave narratives to read and summarize their content. What did you learn about slavery from these primary accounts?
3. "Hiram Rhoades Revels was a carpetbagger." Defend and Counter this statement after reading about his life.
4. How did the Ku Klux Klan - one of the nation's first terrorist groups - so instantly seize the South in the aftermath of the Civil War? Why did it so quickly vanish?
5. What incident does the following political cartoon by Thomas Nast refer to?

Chapter 13: 1876-1900--Changes on the Western Frontier

Extra credit questions for chapter 13:

1. Summarize, in your own words, the meaning of the Ist section of the Dawes Act.
2. What happened to major Reno and his men at the Battle of the Little Big Horn?
3. What led tribes such as the Sioux,Cheyenne, Crow, Blackfoot to adopt a nomadic way of life on the great plains?
4. Who was Jack Wilson, and what did he promise the American Indians?
5. Reading the eyewitness account of the battle near the Little Big Horn River, explain why the narrator felt bows and arrows were superior to guns in warfare.
6. What did Fred A. Shannon contend was the trouble with the Homestead Act?
7. How did Eugene Ring travel to the gold mines of California?
8. Describe a "soddie".
9. Name one interesting fact about William McKinley.
10. How did Martha Jane Cannary get her nickname?

Chapter 14: 1876-1900--The Industrial Ages

Extra credit questions for chapter 14:

1. List at least three other major achievements Of Alexander Graham Bell, other than the telephone.
2. . Who said, "Always do right. That will gratify some of the people, and astonish the rest."
3. What did Samuel Langhorne Clemens do during the civil war?
4. Which quote by Mark Twain do you like the most? Explain why.
5. Who said, "Genius was 1 percent inspiration and 99 percent perspiration."?, and how much formal education did this person have?
6. Why did Congress decree that that the last spike commemorating the transcontinental connection be placed at Promontory Mountains, rather than the spot where they actually met?
7. Andrew Carnegie spend over $56 million to build 2,509 libraries throughout the English-speaking world. Give at least three reasons that motivated his actions.
8. Explain the following statement: "Laissez-faire capitalism, racism, nationalism all are manifestations of Social Darwinism."
9. Who was Mother Jones, and why was she considered, "the most dangerous woman in America"?
10. Why did Governor John Peter Altgeld refuse to send the Illinois militia during the Pullman strike?

Chapter 15: 1876-1914--Immigrants and Urbanization

Extra credit questions for chapter 15:

1. How did Angel Island differ from Ellis Island?
2. Describe the facilities at Angel Island.
3. Why did Jane Addams avoid marriage?
4. The California earthquake of April 18, 1906 ranks as one of the most significant earthquakes of all times. List the damages and losses suffered. (i.e., number of dead, homeless, buildings lost, monetary cost. Which photo impressed you the most?
5. " Angelo, aged fourteen years, cannot work legally in a factory until he reaches a higher grade in school, nor can he work at home during hours when school is in session, but his little sister Maria, aged three years, because she is not old enough to go to school and because the home work law contains no prohibition of child labor, may help her mother pull bastings and sew on buttons." What problem is being described here?
6. From what country did Thomas Nast immigrate?
7. How did Thomas Nast get his first job as an illustrator?
8. What issue appears to have been the most politically disastrous for President Benjamin Harrison?
9. Why couldn’t President Arthur seek a second term in office?
10. Who was Roscoe Conkling?

Chapter 16: 1877-1917--Life at the Turn of the Century

Extra credit questions for chapter16:

1. For what reason, specifically, was Orville Wright’s first flight famous?
2. How did George Eastman change the world of photography?
3. His famous dictum was " Form ever follows function" Who was he and what does this mean?
4. He taught his students the dignity and the beauty of labor and that learning a trade was more necessary sometimes than the study of Greek and Latin verbs. "It is at the bottom of life we must begin," he told his students," and not at the top." Who was he and what is he noted for?
5. The town of Igo in Shasta County, California, bears a searing memory of the suffering and humiliation endured by many of the early Chinese immigrant workers. How did this town get its name? What is "Gam-San"?
6. Who said, "... the highest mission of the press is to render public service."?
7. Today, Hearst Newspapers publishes 12 daily newspapers, name five of them.
8. In the Santa Lucia Mountains of California on a hilltop overlooking the Pacific Ocean, craftsmen labored nearly 28 years to create a magnificent estate of 165 rooms and 127 acres of gardens ,terraces, pools, and walkways. Its name is La Cuesta Encantada-"The Enchanted Hill." What do we know it as today?
9. What does the term, vaudeville, refer to?
10. "Chicago in the beginning of the century was ripe for a series of changes. Jane Addams was trying to improve the social network of the citizens, Upton Sinclair released shocking evidence on the conditions within the Packing industry and the political consequences and the city had never really aesthetically recovered from the devastating fire in 1873. Who was Daniel Burnham, and what was he noted for?

Chapter 17: 1890-1920--The Progressive Era

Extra credit questions for chapter17:

1. "Of 508 babies received at the Randall's Island Hospital last year 333 died,65.55 per cent.", so reports Jacob Riis, in his book, How the Other Half Lives, Chapter XVI. Waifs of the City's Slums. What does he feel is the cause of this high infant mortality?
2. What was the NAWSA’s "southern strategy,"?
3. What was Carrie Chapman Catt’s "Winning Plan" for women’s suffrage?
4. In 1848 the American Academy of Arts and Sciences voted her the first woman member. Who was she and why did she receive an education equal to that of a boy?
5. He became the first African American to be awarded a doctoral degree from Harvard University. Who was he?
6. Taft held many public roles. Name three of them.
7. She was a principal in Mason City, Iowa. In 1883, she became one of the first women appointed superintendent. Who was she and where did she get her college degree?
8. When was the Federal Reserve Board founded and what are its duties?
9. Who’s nickname was "Schoolmaster in Politics".? Why?

Chapter 18: 1890-1920--America Claims an Empire

Extra credit questions for chapter18:

1. "After temporarily resolving the problems of Reconstruction and Industrialization, Americans began to resume the course of expansion. The horrors of the Civil War had interrupted the original Manifest Destiny that began in the 1840s. Now, as pioneers settled the last western frontiers, expansionists looked yet farther to the west -- toward Asia and the Pacific." How did America act imperialistically in Asia and the Pacific?
2. When, where, and how did McKinley’s second term come to an end?
3. "We have been treacherous; but that was only in order that real good might come out of apparent evil. True, we have crushed a deceived and confiding people; we have turned against the weak and the friendless who trusted us; we have stamped out a just and intelligent and well-ordered republic; we have stabbed an ally in the back and slapped the face of a guest; we have bought a Shadow from an enemy that hadn't it to sell; we have robbed a trusting friend of his land and his liberty; we have invited our clean young men to shoulder a discredited musket and do bandit's work under a flag which bandits have been accustomed to fear, not to follow; we have debauched America's honor and blackened her face before the world; but each detail was for the best." To what is Mark Twain referring to here?
4. How did the Boxer Rebellion contribute to the success of the Open Door Notes?
5. What served as Teddy Roosevelt’s big stick in Panama?
6. List at least three interesting facts about Francisco Villa.
7. Compare and contrast the weapons of the Gulf War with the weapons of the Spanish-American War.
8. Read the first-hand accounts of the exploits and experiences of soldiers and pilots in the Gulf War. What did you learn from these primary sources?
9. How did the Panama Canal prove to be the greatest engineering feat of the ages?
10. What happens to the canal in the year 2000?

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