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• Study the migration of Virginians to other areas. Why did they leave? Where did they go?
What did they take? Include the settlement of California and Texas in the analysis.
• Research black cowboys who settled in the West.
• Research famous Virginians who went West such as Henry Clay, James Beckwourth, Bigfoot Wallace, Sam
Houston, George Caleb Bingham. What former Virginians became poitical leaders in their adopted states or territories?
(Some 230 men born in Virginia before 1810 became members of Congress in other states; 73 native Virginians
became governors of other states and territories between 1779 and 1861).
• Study the spread of slavery into new areas of the United States. Research how
this migration made slavery a national issue.
• Using the diary of Elizabeth Ann Cooley (1825-1848), make a chart of the major events,
(domestic and foreign) that would make newspaper headlines at the time. Be sure to include outstanding
American presidents and other famous people.
• Using the Cooley diary as a guide, read and research the daily activities in western Virginia in the 1840s.
Discuss the process of shearing sheep to weave wool. What other activities and responsibilities are described in the journal?
• What modes of transportation existed in the early 1800s? Discuss some of the hazards
or dangers encountered when traveling west at this time. Where were the major western Indian tribes located?
• Trace the travels of Elizabeth Cooley and James McClure from Virginia to Texas to Missouri on a map. Locate
places mentioned in the diary. Calculate where they would be at a given time by traveling 20 miles per day in
their wagon.
• Set up a journal-writing project. Students can write their daily activities that may someday be as
interesting as the Cooley journal, or they may want to create their own western journal set in a specific period.
This would involve historical research into the place and events of that time. List the different word usages,
spellings, and grammar within the journal. Why was education so important but so difficult to obtain at this
time on the frontier?
• Create a unit of study on medicine in the early 19th century. What problems and diseases
are mentioned in Cooley's journal? What cures were available? Research both medical knowledge and herbal
medicinal suggested cures of that time period.
• Critical Thinking: Questions for discussion
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