1541 – Coronado visits Kansas, makes contact
with the Wichita
1673 – Jolliet and Marquette name Kansas
1803 – Kansas is a part of the Louisiana
Purchase
1804 – Lewis and Clark Expedition reaches
Kansas
1821 – Santa Fe Trail Opens
1830 - US Congress passes the Indian
Removal Act to relocate more eastern tribes
to Kansas Territory
1843 – Oregon and California Trails open
Invasions and Encounters
Chap. 3, p. (44- 65)
Reasons Europeans Explored Kansas:
Spread Christianity
Conquest of new lands
Trade and Wealth
New Knowledge
Spanish Exploration
French Exploration
 Seeking gold and
 Establish trade with the
conquest of new lands
Indians (native
Americans)
Francisco Vasquez de Coronado – sought to
find mythical city of gold (Quivira); made
contact with the Wichita in 1541
 Fabled city of Gold (in present day
Kansas)
 Coronado failed to find gold, relieved
of his command and put on trial for
mistreating the natives
 French explorers and traders
established trade with Indians
 Kansas is named for the Kansa Indians
 Jolliet placed the name “Kansas” and
“Missouri” on a map
French Explorers in Kansas
 Jolliet and Marquette - from Canada followed
Mississippi River to Missouri River. Jolliet placed
the name “Kansas” and “Missouri” on a map
 Claude Charles Du Tisne failed to make alliances
with the Comanche Indians but made connections
with the Osage and Pawnee
 Etienne Veniard de Bourgmont set up relations with
the Kansa and Apache
Trading in Kansas
 Indians were asked to give loyalty to the European
monarchy, royal family
 Sovereign Rights – the right for the people to choose
who rules them ( this was denied to the Kansas tribes)
 Europeans brought new diseases to the Indians like
smallpox and the flu
Louisiana Purchase
Napoleon Bonaparte (Emperor of France) sold a huge
area of land known as Louisiana to the United States.
Most of Kansas was part of the Louisiana Purchase
(p.51)
 Napoleon needed money to build up his military against
England and he didn’t want the land to fall into English
hands.
 The Louisiana Purchase doubled the size of the U.S.
 Meriwether Lewis and William Clark
 Zebulon Pike
 Stephen H. Long
Meriwether Lewis and William Clark
 Sent by President Thomas Jefferson to explore new
areas of the nation, incl. Louisiana Purchase (1803)
 Traveled by boat; looking for a water route to the
Pacific Ocean
 Seemed to like Kansas, commenting on the variety of
game and a prairie of great beauty
Zebulon Pike
 Sent to make peace between the Osage and Kansa
tribes
 Observed and brought back many botanical and
mineral samples (similar to Lewis and Clark)
 Asked Pawnee to take down Spanish flag and put up
American flag
 Described land as a desert
 Botanical - referring to plant species
Stephen H. Long
 Explored and mapped the southwest part of the
country. He traveled by steamboat
 Long was first to publish a U.S. atlas with state and
territory maps; labeled the area that would become
Kansas “The Great Desert”
Indian Removal Act
 Andrew Jackson moved the Indians from the eastern
part of the nation to the west. Over 25 tribes were
forced to move to Kansas.
 Assimilate - adapt to fit in
 Isaac McCoy tried to protect Indian way of life and
create an Indian state where Indians would be
assimilated and converted to Christianity
The Emigrant Indian Experience
 Tribes were assigned to reservations. Many tribes did
not like living so close together because their cultures
were so different
Missionaries
 Missionaries worked to covert Indians to Christianity
and teach them European ways of life
 Vocation skills – basic work skills
 Boarding schools – schools where kids live away from
their families
Trails Through Kansas
 Santa Fe Trail
 Built to allow trade
 Started by William Becknell
Oregon-California Trail
Used by people who wanted to move west
The trip 4 to 6 months
Manifest Destiny
 The idea that America was meant to expand from coast
to coast and was blessed by a higher power
 Chain mail - looped metal armor
 New World – the name Europeans gave the
Americas
 Confluence - where two or more rivers come
together
 Wichita trades with the Indians from the
southwest brought to Kansas looking for gold, thus
making contact with the Spanish
 Missionaries set up schools to convert Indian children
to Christianity and to teach them vocational* skills
 The main goal of missionary schools was to change
the culture of the child – to Americanize the
Indian
* Vocation: an occupation
 Indian Removal Act of 1830 - moved Indian tribes in
the East to lands west of the Mississippi
 Member of the Delaware
tribe who operated a
ferry boat on the Kansas
River