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Fifth Grade
Moving West
Below are
student products for your enjoyment. Scroll down to read the
historically-based diary entry.
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Dear Diary,
My name is Patrick Murphy. I am 12 years old. Right now we’re in
California hammering down the GOLDEN NAIL of the railroad. The 2 tough guys tried to hit
the nail and missed. Then a city guy hit it and got it in. Everyone started to laugh. It
was very funny. Well tomorrow is another day.
I hope I don’t have to go into the valley and set off the gun powder
so we can clear a path and build the railroad going back east. Last week, a Chinese man
named Jing Yung Lo was killed in an explosion in the valley. We just left him there and
kept working. I felt like I would be next.
In my prayer tonight, I’m going to remind God that I’m too young
to die.
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Dear Diary,
Today was a bad day for me. One of my Chinese friends died today blasting. I really
don’t think he deserved it, but not Carin he got paid less and had to find his own
shelter an food. It was unreal, the person above didn’t even seem to try to pull him
up. Then the explosion came an he either jumped or got blasted off and hit ground below. I
got whipped for not trying my hardest but I mean I was sad. Lately I’ve heard rumors
about Charles makin a bet with Mister Grenville Dodge. More and more Irish and Chinese are
comin’ and less and less Americans. But I’m glad more o them are comin’.
Those guys work so hard they got the nickname terriers. It pains me to see them be paid
less than us Americans just cause they’re Chinese or Irish. All that they work harder
than I do and I get paid more. I hope I don’t get chosen to blast tomorrow but wer
almost through the mountain so there won’t be much more blasting.
Dear Diary,
Just my luck, I got stuck with blastin duty today. Except for some minor burns I came
out okay. I’m guessin Charles lost the bet cause he ain’t to happy any more. He
may be mad but I’m glad I didn’t end up like my friend. I don’t even know
who pulled me up. There are a lot off new workers come in and they’re all Civil War
veterans and freed slaves. I’ve been hearin somethin about a golden spike lately.
They say it’s a spike there gonna use on the last tie, made of gold. Well I better
get to sleep.
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It’s so hot and dry out here even the buffalo are
sweating’ and it gets mighty lonesome. When we wake up in the mornin’ I
don’t have to change because I’m already wearing my muddy jeans, cowboy boots,
dusty hat, dirty bandanna, and sweaty shirt. After a cup o’ jo, we head out to herd
up the grazin’ cattle. We grab some grub, usually deer meat, and mosey out west
‘til we find trees and maybe a river or stream so we can wet our whistle.
We don’t get a break until after the sky is loaded with stars. Then we are too
tired to eat or to sit around the campfire. So we doze off for about six hours, too
exhausted to even hear coyotes, bear, or buffalo. The cattle wake us before sunup and we
start over.
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Dear diary,
I got plenty o time to write tonight cause I got watch duty. My partner tendin to a
sick calf. The job’s not easy but someone’s gotta do it. I can’t quite
remember how many times I’ve done a cattle drive, but it was 20 somthin. It’s
actually quite peaceful workin under the stars with only the moon to light the way. Right
now were about half way through the Chisholm Trail. We got 50 cattle in this drive and 49
o them are grazin now. The watering whole here is pretty big from here. Today was a pretty
ordinary day. That is unless you count the shootout with the rustler. He tried shootin the
ground and picken up the scared cattle. We didn’t stand for it so we took out their
horses and left em there. They were bad shots anyhow. We were surprised no cattle got away
in the confusion. We also had trouble with a rancher who claimed we broke down his fence
and destroyed his crops but he didn’t want a shootout. He said once the field marshal
found out we’d get it good. Well the folk are risen so I’d better get to work.
Dear diary,
Today was a very ordinary day. The cattle ate drank and moved along nicely. There were
a few stubborn ones I had to go back for but that was about it.
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Hi, my name is Mary Lingburg. We just finished traveling
west from Virginia. Traveling like a homesteader is very hard. I was afraid
of Indians coming to take over the wagon. I heard in school about how Indians are
deadly and mean. I was also tired of riding for two months and there was no water for
miles. I was very thirsty.
I live with my family in Nevada now. It looks very different from Virginia. All you see
are plains and woodlands. There are no cities like Virginia. The only people are my
grandparents and some cousins.
My cousins helped my two brothers and one sister and my parents build a cottage out of
different kinds of wood. We used lumber and we cut down maples and evergreen trees on our
land, which we purchased for 15 cents per acre.
My grandparents made their first home in the west out of dirt in Kansas. The house was
built into a hill and they dug an underground trail to get into the house. This was a very
cheap house because they had to make it themselves. It cost about $4.27. Cows grazed on
the roof when the roof of the house collapsed. Then my grandparents came to live with us
in Virginia then moved with us here to Nevada.
We are called sod busters because we use a tool called the mechanizer. It can harvest
grains faster than a riding bull chasing cattle.
Life on the plains is very hard. My pa has to harvest in mid-summer and it’s so
hot that he jokes that he wants to drink his sweat. I sometimes fan myself with my bonnet
to keep cool. We hope we don’t have a drought because nothing will grow. It will be
so hot that we will not be able to live and we will starve. If there is a drought, we will
have to move again and it’s too hot to move. "Mary." "Coming
Mom." Well, gotta go.
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Dear diary,
The trail was tough but I am here. I ‘m settlin’ in the great plain and am
trying to make a shelter today. I am making a sod dug out because it is cheap and easy to
build and doesn’t take much wood. There are not many trees around here. I added up
the total cost of my new house and it only costed $2.89. Thanks to the homesteading act,
this land was nine cents an acre, practically free!
Dear diary,
Today I finished my house and moved onto my second concern, water. Water is scarce here
in the great plain. We use it for many things on this here farm. To get it I had to dig a
well 25 feet deep. Twice I hit on hard rock, but the third time I hit water. Tomorrow I
might start working on some irrigation ditches.
Dear diary,
The irrigation ditches are almost complete. Tomorrow I plan on startin’ the
ploughin’ of the land. Thanks to James Oliver we now have a horse-drawn plough that
can cut through sod as easy as a knife through butter. On this farm I dearly intend on
planting much corn and grain thanks to the Russians. I hope those annoying varmints
don’t get to my crops this year. The grasshoppers tend to eat homesteads worth of
crops. There ain’t no way to stop them varmints!
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Hi, my name is Chief Little Big Horn and I am chief of a
Native American tribe in the Midwest.
I fear General George Custer is ruining our beautiful, outstanding land. When General
Custer was a young child, all he ever wanted to be when he grew up was a general. He got
his wish and he is the most successful general I have ever seen in war time.
Years ago, General Custer’s army attacked my tribe because the white men wanted to
own our land and we refused to give up our land. In the attack, General Custer rode on
saddled horses through the plains with guns loaded and the American flag waving in the
wind behind them.
Native Americans and soldiers died in the battle and the tribe was forced to live in a
government owned foundation. It is a long house big enough for all the survivors to live.
The soldiers wanted the Native Americans to go to the president and become American
citizens.
We wanted to be free so we could save the buffalo because the soldiers are killing
them. They skin them and leave them there. They don’t use mush the brain onto the fur
to make it softer. They don’t eat the buffalo meat. The soldiers play a game where
they ride on a train and shoot the buffalo to see how many they can knock down. This makes
me feel sad because the soldiers let all those buffaloes go to waste and they are making
them be an endangered species.
So the tribe left the foundation and headed back to our home land. Some tribe members
starved and some lived and fought for the land again. This time they won and took the
soldiers clothes.
Now it is night. We have no food or shelter. Why did we ever leave?
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Dear Diary,
Me and my elders talked about life on the
reservation today. They say our ancestors were put here by the white man. We were forced
to come to the reservation because the white man broke the treaty that gave us Oklahoma.
They say Sitting Bull is planning to get our land back so we can leave the reservation.
Dear Diary,
I heard that a white man named George Custer led an attack on one
of our villages near the Wachita River. They burned our village down and killed many of
our tribe. The elders say that George Custer will pay some day for what he has done to our
village.
Dear Diary,
I heard today that General Howard attacked the Nez Perce along the
Wallowa River as they were escaping to Canada. All of the chiefs were killed in the
attack. Our children were lost and freezing to death. They had no food, no blankets and no
one knew where they were. |
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