Use this activity with your students before or after they watch the programs Buffalo Bill or Kit Carson, or explore American Experience's online offerings on the American West.

A free set of American Experience maps showing Westward expansion, American Frontiers, may be of use in your classroom before or after using this activity.

Write the terms that match the following descriptions.

1. In the Proclamation of 1763, the British government forbade American colonists to settle west of this mountain range.

2. This 1787 law set the rules by which new states would be formed from the territory between the Ohio River and the Great Lakes.

3. This deal between the United States and France in 1803 doubled the size of the United States.

4. This river marked the western boundary of the United States until 1803.

5. In 1804, these two men began a two-year exploration of the United States' new western territories.

6. In 1812, the United States went to war with this major European power in part because of the latter's support for Indian tribes on the American frontier.

7. In 1819 the United States purchased Florida from this country.

8. Completed in 1825, this waterway across New York State helped connect the East Coast and the Midwest.

9. This area, independent since 1836, was annexed by the United States in 1845.

10. In the 1838 "Trail of Tears," these Indian people were forced to leave their homes and move west of the Mississippi.

11. In 1843, large numbers of migrants started using this overland route to travel westward from Missouri to Oregon.

12. In 1848, this country was forced to give up a large part of its territory after being defeated in war by the United States.

13. The discovery of this natural resource in California in 1848 led to a stampede of migrants, sometimes called the "forty-niners."

14. This 1862 law encouraged the settlement of the West by granting land to people who would farm it.

15. Completed in 1869, this transportation link made it possible for goods and people to travel from one end of the country to the other much more quickly.

16. In 1876 this Sioux leader destroyed a U.S. cavalry unit led by General George Custer at the Little Bighorn.

17. In 1879 these African Americans migrated from the South to establish farms in Kansas.

18. In 1886 this Apache warrior, one of the most feared and respected Indian fighters, finally surrendered to U.S. forces.

19. This 1890 killing of Sioux Indians by U.S. Cavalry troops is often seen as the end of the Indian Wars.

20. In 1893 this historian declared that the western frontier, which he said had played a key role in shaping American history, was now closed.