Download Westward Movement notes

Virginians Move West
Name: _______________________
Westward Migration
Thomas Jefferson was elected as the third President of the United States in 1800. Three
years after becoming president he nearly doubled the size of the United States. At that time,
France was trying to expand its empire in Europe and needed more money to do so.
Jefferson was originally interested in only buying the city of New Orleans for ten million
dollars, but was offered the rest of the territory for only five million more. He accepted the
offer making one of the biggest land deals in history. The Louisiana Purchase added over
800,000 square miles of land to the United States.
After the American Revolution, many Virginians began to head west. For close to 200
years, Virginia farmers had been planting tobacco. Over the course of time, the soil‘s
nutrients had become exhausted because they did not practice crop rotation and other
methods of restoring the soil nutrients. Smaller and smaller harvests caused problems for
farmers trying to make a profit with tobacco. Therefore, they wanted to find new land and
new opportunities. Many farmers began looking to the south and west for new land. Some
Virginians had heard about the Louisiana Territory, a huge piece of land that the American
government owned.
Almost one million Virginians left, changing Virginia from the most
populated state to the seventh most populated state in the United States.
When men, women, and children from Virginia left their homes to move west, they
were not only taking their possessions. They were taking with them some intangible things as
well – their traditions, ideas, and cultures. The new communities that they settled would
reflect these things. They traveled through a place in the Valley and Ridge region known as
the Cumberland Gap to get to their new homes out west.
The Cumberland Gap is a low
point in the Cumberland Mountains where the states of Tennessee, Kentucky and Virginia all
meet.
DIRECTIONS: Shade in the area of land that was purchased by Jefferson in 1803.
DIRECTIONS: (1) Label the bordering states of Virginia, (2) label and then shade in the region where
the Cumberland Gap is located; (3) mark the location of the Cumberland Gap on the map with a star.
Name: ______________
Date: ______
Virginians Move to the Western Frontier
After the American Revolution, Virginia’s agricultural base began to change. Many people ______
______ and to the _______ _______ because of agricultural changes. They were looking for
______ _________ and new opportunities.
Geographic Factors Influencing the Move to the
Western Frontier
1. _________ farming was hard on the ______, causing many farmers to look ______ and
______ for new land to farm.
2. Virginians migrated into ________ _________ looking for ____ _____ of _____ and
_____ ___________.
3. As Virginians moved, they took their ________, _____, and ________ with them.
4. Settlers crossed the __________ _________ through the ___________ _____ as
they migrated to new lands.