The West had to somehow solve its water deficit if that region were ever to overcome its retarded growth and development. Irrigation offered at least a partial solution if the rivers could be tapped, and this concept opened a whole new phase in the legislative, political, and economic development of the West and of the nation.

Like most whites living on the Pacific Coast during the late nineteenth century, white residents of Astoria, Oregon supported the notion that the Chinese, as a race, were culturally and economically depraved and certainly worthy of exclusion. Nonetheless, Chinese immigrants had a significant presence in Astoria, and while the anti-Chinese attitudes of local whites appeared straightforward, probing on-the-ground race relations reveals that they were actually quite complex. This thesis shows that white Astorians struggled to reconcile a principled stance against the Chinese with the pragmatism of accepting at least a temporary place for them in the community. The variegated roles that the Chinese played in Astoria and their tangible presence in different spheres of town life were recognized, even if only begrudgingly, by white Astorians. Overall, the contradictions that characterized race language and race relations demonstrate that the contours of race in late-nineteenth-century Astoria were multiple, undefined, and constantly negotiated.

My Land, My Life is a documentary film about the woman, Jo Angela Lamb, who lives and works on Frying Pan Ranch in Texas Panhandle. the film explores the complexity of a ranch woman's experience that breaks the spell of the stereotyped image of American cowgirls. It also reflects on women ranchers’ relationship with their family members and their relationship with the land.

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During the middle of the nineteenth century, vast numbers of Chinese immigrants arrived on the west coast of the United States. Here, they sought a better life for themselves and their families back home. The new arrivals often became targets of violence and discrimination as anti-Chinese sentiment grew in the country. Chinese immigrants protected and provided for themselves by creating a variety of organizations in their communities. One such organization became known as the tong. Many groups organized themselves around family names, regional background, or employment, but tongs accepted anyone who wanted to join. The promise of physical protection, economic gain, and acceptance in a community incentivized many Chinese men to join tongs. Tongs provided a space in which Chinese men could reclaim masculinity and practice traditional gender roles. Faced with discrimination, physical abuse, marginalization, and governmental neglect, tongs filled the power vacuum in Chinese communities. Tongs became powerful leaders within Chinatowns across the West. Beginning in the 1880s, tongs clashed with one another in events known as tong wars. By 1930, the era of tong wars came to an end. Once the powerhouse of the Chinese community, tong influence declined as Chinese residents successfully gained recognition, and fought back against racism and legislative discrimination. During the twentieth century, tongs transitioned from groups focused on economic gain (often through vice) and physical protection of its members to a fraternal order within Chinatown. Examination of tongs, tong wars, and the reasons for their decline creates greater understanding of Chinese communities and a broader understanding of how immigrant communities respond to discrimination within communities, and denied governmental protection and assistance.

Thesis (M.S.)--Wisconsin State University (La Crosse), 1971. / Digitized and made available by the University of Wisconsin--La Crosse, Murphy Library. Includes bibliographical references (leaf [46]). Online version of print edition.

One can compare Guthrie's fiction with a sampling of the primary source material, to determine in general his degree of historical accuracy. Then one can compare Guthrie's interpretation with the interpretations of some widely read historiographers, to determine points of agreement or divergence. Finally, Guthrie's interpretation of history can be studied in relation to the themes he develops in his fiction.

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The memory of past violence in Missouri and Illinois during the 1830s and 1840s shaped how members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Latter-day Saints or Mormons) saw themselves, their persecutors, and the states and the nation where the violence occurred. This thesis explores the role of collective memory of violence in forming Mormon identities and images of place from 1838, when governor Lilburn W. Boggs expelled the Latter-day Saints from Missouri, to 1858, with the conclusion of the Utah War. I argue that Latter-day Saint authors during these two decades used the memory of persecution to create and reinforce a communal identity as a means of resistance against oppression. The memory of persecution led Mormon writers to alter their image of the United States as a land of liberty, recasting the nation as a place of oppression, and coming to see the American West, in particular the Salt Lake Valley, as a new land of liberty. The thesis contains four chapters. Chapter I provides historical and theoretical background. Chapter II is an analysis of the martyrological tropes utilized by Mormon essayists from 1838 to 1858 to construct a group identity based on the memory of shared suffering and resistance against oppression. I show that remembering persecution allowed these writers to portray themselves as members of an elect community that included biblical prophets and ancient Christians. In turn, Mormon authors also represented their persecutors as part of a community of God's enemies, upon whom God would bring vengeance, either in this life or the next. Chapter III explores how Latter-day Saint essayists used the memory of persecution to form images of place. Although the Mormons believed that the nation was a divinely-established country based on religious freedom, portraying the violence against them as religious persecution led Latter-day Saint authors to discursively cast the deserts and mountains of the Great Basin as their new refuge. In Chapter IV I briefly examine ways that the memory of persecution shaped Mormon-non-Mormon interactions in the American West as a means to summarize the themes introduced in the thesis.

Evelyn Jephson Cameron (1868-1928) was born to a wealthy merchant family outside London. At the age of twenty-five, she moved to Terry, Montana to raise horses and homestead with her husband, Ewen Cameron. Evelyn Cameron recorded their time in eastern Montana in her daily diary entries, which span over thirty-five years from 1893 to 1928. She became a self-taught professional photographer, and made thousands of photographs with large-format cameras of the people in the towns of Terry, Fallon, and Marsh. She photographed the landscape, birds, and other animals she kept as pets or encountered in the wild. She wrote in her private diary nearly every day, offering a first-person point of view of life for women in the late nineteenth-century in the American West. This thesis focuses on three particular aspects of Cameron’s life. The first chapter focuses on spaces or mediums that Cameron had access to that offered her autonomy and privacy, things which were often difficult for women to find at this time. These spaces and mediums include her photography, her diary, and her darkroom, all of which gave her different sorts of calm or control. The second chapter delves into Cameron’s photographic portraits of herself and other women, looking into how women portrayed themselves and others in the American West. Cameron depicted herself as a part of the natural world, and she also did so when capturing other women. The final chapter analyzes Cameron’s identity as a Montanan, from her conscious choice to move there to her refusal to return to Britain permanently. She gained American citizenship in 1918 and took living in Montana seriously. Her diary reveals a deep awareness of the natural world and records accomplishments and events that help to build and strengthen her relationship with her chosen home. / Graduate / 2018-08-25