APUSH Topic Outline 1.

Pre-Columbian Societies
2. 1. PRE-COLUMBIAN SOCIETIES Early inhabitants of the Americas Archeologists believe they came tens of thousands of years ago across the Bering Strait when ice covered the water between Asia and North America. 3. Because they came at different times and because they settled in different areas, they became extremely diverse. Probably the earliest immigrants ended up farthest south. -American Indian empires in Mesoamerica, the Southwest, and the Mississippi Valley Each of the empires was built on two foundations: cultivated crops (maize, squash, beans) and trade. Each varied in technological advancements but all had relatively sophisticated societies. -Mesoamerica: Aztecs, Incans, Mayans -Southwest: Pueblo -Mississippi Valley: Mississippians/Mound Builders 4. American Indian cultures of North America at the time of European contact The key point here is that the cultures were highly diverse. By the time Columbus arrived, historians estimate there were at least 300 different languages spoken in the Americas.

5. Transatlantic Encounters and Colonial Beginnings, 1492-1690

2. TRANSATLANTIC ENCOUNTERS AND COLONIAL BEGINNINGS, 1492-1690 First European contacts with Native Americans Columbus led the way with initial contacts. His descriptions of Indians as being less intelligent than Europeans, friendly and submissive set the tone for early contacts. Columbus remarked that the natives believe he was a celestial being descended from the heavens. The contacts were generally friendly, but occasionally ended in violence. When violence occured, the Native Americans were ill-equipped to deal with Spanish iron weapons and gunpowder. In addition, disease was introduced by the Europeans and this led to the decimation of many native peoples and cultures. -Spains empire in North America The Spanish encountered Indians in the area of Mesoamerica and the encounters were characterized by both violence and the destruction and/or enslavement of native cultures by the conquistadors and by peaceful attempts at conversion to Catholicism by the Dominicans. -the Spanish ruled directly from the monarchy through the Council of the Indies(in Spain)

and the viceroys (in America) -the encomienda system got the conquistadores to settle down and function as colonists -the Dominicans established missions all over the Americas: notably Father Serra in California -there was a great debate in the 1500s in Spain over whether or not Indians were fully human or subhuman; the debate was prompted by Las Casas defense of the natives as fully human and deserving more respect French colonization of Canada The French encounters with the Eastern Woodland Indians in Canada were relatively friendly because the French courier du bois needed the Indians for the fur trade and because New France was sparsely populated. The French Jesuits also sought to convert natives to Catholicism. English settlement of New England, the Mid-Atlantic region, and the South -The early English settlements were generally small fortified villages that tried to keep Native Americans at a distance. In Jamestown, hostility developed between natives and colonists. Although there was a period of peace, 1622 brought an Indian retaliation (the massacre of 1622). In Plimouth, native relations with the colonists were positive for fifty years, beginning with the first thanksgiving recorded by Bradford in his History of Plimouth Plantation. The peace ended with King Philips War in 1676. New England Colonies were dominated by Calvinists. The mother colony was Massachusetts Bay, established to, as the Puritan Governor Winthrop put it, be a city on a hill-a beacon of Christianity for the whole world. -New England from the first was to be a religious haven and a place for families to literally plant a new society. -Massachusetts Bay was intolerant and proud to be a Bible Commonwealth. -Congregationalism defined the spread of settlements and helped foster town meetings. -small farmers and fisherman, and later on, shipping merchants, dominated the economy Middle Colonies were characterized by diversity and tolerance. -motives for emigration varied from colony to colony. -Pennsylvania, New York, and New Jersey had a variety of religious groups and nationalities: Quakers, Jews, Anglicans, Catholics and Germans, Dutch, Swedes, English, Scots-Irish. -These colonies were considered to be the breadbasket of the all the colonies because of their food crops. -Pennsylvania had the best long-lasting relationship with Native Americans in the colonial period. The Southern Colonies were characterized by their individualistic profit motives, their allegiance to England, their Anglican faith. -a cash crop economy that included tobacco, rice, and indigo in this time period. -although slavery existed all over the colonies, ultimately it was the Southern colonies that fostered slavery for life.

From servitude to slavery in the Chesapeake region: -Indentured servitude, used originally to teach a trade, was used in the Cheasapeake as a way to secure gang labor in exchange for passage to America. -Slaves were introduced in 1619 to Virginia. -As slaves became a more popular and stable way to secure a gang labor force, slavery became firmly established in the Cheasapeake by 1700. Religious diversity in the American colonies: Because there was quite a bit of religious diversity in the colonies, the colonies grew increasingly tolerant over time because of increased contact-particularly in trade-with each other. Resistance to colonial authority: Bacons Rebellion -Nathaniel Bacon (upper class but not part of the in crowd) led a western rebellion against Governor Berkley of Virginia for the latters failing to protect the western colonists from Indian attack. -a royal investigation followed that found a great deal of fault with the governor. the Glorious Revolution -In the wake of the overthrow of Catholic King James II (formerly Duke of York) by William and Mary (his sister and her hubby), the New England colonists rebelled against the governor of the Dominion of New England, Sir Edmund Andros. the Pueblo Revolt -In the late 1600s, the Pueblo Indians of New Mexico rebelled against repressive Spanish colonial policies and drove the Spanish from Santa Fe.

6. 7. 8. 9.

Colonial North America, 1690-1754 The American Revolutionary Era, 1754-1789 The Early Republic, 1789-1815 Transformation of the Economy and Society in Antebellum America 10.The Transformation of Politics in Antebellum America 11.Religion, Reform, and Renaissance in Antebellum America 12.Territorial Expansion and Manifest Destiny 10.The Crisis of the Union 11.Civil War 12.Reconstruction 13.The Origins of the New South 14.Development of the West in the Late Nineteenth Century 15.Industrial America in the Late Nineteenth Century 16.Urban Society in the Late Nineteenth Century 17.Populism and Progressivism

18.The Emergence of America as a World Power 19.The New Era: 1920s 20.The Great Depression and the New Deal 21.The Second World War 22.The Home Front During the War 23.The United States and the Early Cold War 24.The 1950s 25.The Turbulent 1960s 26.Politics and Economics at the End of the Twentieth Century 27.Society and Culture at the End of the Twentieth Century 28.The United States in the Post-Cold War World