Practice on stories - American History: Buffalo, 'Mystery Dogs' (Horses) and the Lives of the Plains Indians

Native people believed that the bison offered everything they needed. Nothing went to waste. But hunting them was difficult -- until the Spanish brought horses to North America in the 1500s.

American History: Buffalo, 'Mystery Dogs' (Horses) and the Lives of the Plains Indians

Voice Man:

This is Rich Kleinfeldt.

Voice Woman:

And this is Sarah Long with the MAKING OF A NATION, a VOA Special English program about the history of the United States. Today, we tell about early Native Americans.

Voice Man:

Scientists believe that the native peoples of America came here thousands of years ago during the last ice age. These people settled the land from the cold northern areas to the extreme end of South America.

As the groups of people settled different parts of the land, they developed their own languages, their own cultures and their own religions. Each group's story is important in the history of the Americas. However, it is perhaps the tribes of the central part of the United States that are most recognized. They will be our story today.

Voice Woman:

In eighteen-oh-four, Merriwether Lewis and William Clark led a group of explorers to the Pacific Ocean. They were the first educated Americans to see some of the native tribes of the Great Plains.

And they were the first white people these Native American people had ever seen.

When the group of explorers neared the eastern side of the great Rocky Mountains, they met with a tribe of Indians called the Shoshoni. Merriwether Lewis was the first to see them.

Let us imagine we are with Merriwether Lewis near the Rocky Mountains almost two hundred years ago. Across a small hill, a group of sixty Shoshoni men are riding toward us.

Voice Man:

The first thing we see is that these men are ready for war. Each is armed with a bow and arrows. Some carry long poles with a sharp knife on the end.

They are riding very fast. Some horses seem to be without riders. But a closer look shows that the men are hanging off the sides, or under the horse’s neck. They are using the horses' bodies as protection.

The horses are painted with many different designs that use blue, black, red or other colors. Later we learn that each design has a special meaning for the man who owns the horse. Each one tells a story.

For example, the man riding one horse is a leader during battle. Another has killed an enemy in battle. One of the designs protects the horse and rider.

Voice Woman:

As they come nearer, the Shoshoni group sees that we are not ready for war. They slow their horses but are still very careful. Merriwether Lewis holds up a open hand as a sign of peace. The leader of the Shoshoni does the same. They come closer.

The Shoshoni are dressed in clothes made from animal skin. Most of these skins are from deer or the American buffalo. The shirts they wear have many designs, and tell stories like the designs on the horses. One shows a man has fought in a battle. Another shows a man has been in many raids to capture horses. Still another shows the man saved the life of a friend.

Voice Man:

Captain Lewis smiles at these men. He again makes a hand sign that means peace. The signs are now returned. Lewis and the Shoshoni chief cannot speak each other's language. They can communicate using hand signs.

Voice Woman:

One young Shoshoni man comes near. He drops to the ground from his horse. He is tall and looks strong. His hair is black in color and long. He wears one long bird feather in the back of his hair. Some of his hair is held in place by animal fur.

His arms have been painted with long lines. We learn that each line represents a battle. There are many lines. But we leave the Shoshoni without him adding another one.

Voice Man:

The Shoshoni were only one of many tribes of native people who lived in the Great Plains area. The life, culture and society of these tribes developed because of the land that was their home.

The Great Plains today is still huge. Even in a car, traveling at one hundred kilometers an hour, it can take two long days of driving to cross the Great Plains. The plains reach from several hundred kilometers north in Canada across the middle of the continent to Mexico in the south.

In the East, the Great Plains begin near the Mississippi River and go west to the huge Rocky Mountains. It is the center of the United States. There are big rivers here, deserts and mountains. Other areas are so flat that a person can see for hundreds of kilometers. Millions of kilometers of this land were once covered by a thick ocean of grass.

Voice Woman:

The grass provided food for an animal that made possible the culture of the Indians of the Great Plains. The grass fed the bison, the American buffalo.

The buffalo was the center of native Indian culture in the Great Plains. The huge animal provided meat for the Indians. But it was much more than just food. It was an important part of the religion of most of the native people in the Great Plains.

The Lakota tribe is one of the people of the Great Plains. The Lakota are sometimes called the Sioux. They believed that everything necessary to life was within the buffalo. Another Plains tribe, the Blackfeet, called the animal "My home and my protection."

Voice Man:

The back of the huge buffalo provided thick skin that was used to make homes for the Plains Indians. Other parts were made into clothing. Still other parts became warm blankets. Buffalo bones were made into tools. Nothing of the animal was wasted.

No one knows how many buffalo were in North America when Merriwether Lewis first met the Shoshoni. But experts say it was probably between sixty million to seventy-five million.

Voice Woman:

Another animal also helped make possible the Indian cultures of the Great Plains. Native Americans first called these animals mystery dogs, or big dogs. They had no word for this animal in their language. We know it as the horse.

No horses existed in North America before the Spanish arrived in the fifteen hundreds in what is now the southern part of the United States. Native peoples hunted, moved and traveled by foot. Traveling long distances was difficult, so was hunting buffalo.

The horse greatly changed the life of all the people of the Great Plains. It gave them a method of travel. It provided a way to carry food and equipment. It made it easier and safer to follow and hunt the buffalo. The horse made it possible to attack an enemy far away and return safely. The number of horses owned became the measure of a tribe's wealth.

Voice Man:

Spanish settlers rode horses to the small town of Santa Fe in what is now the southwestern state of New Mexico. They arrived there in about the year sixteen-oh-nine.

It is not known how native peoples in Santa Fe got the first horses in the country. Perhaps they traded for them. Perhaps they captured them in an attack. Many tribes soon were trading and capturing horses.

By the seventeen fifties, all the tribes of the Great Plains had horses. They had become experts at raising, training and riding horses. They became experts at horse medicine.

Each Indian of the Great Plains could ride a horse by the age of five. As an adult, a young man would have a special horse for work. Another horse would be trained for hunting. And another would be trained for war. An Indian warrior's success depended upon how closely he and his horses worked together.

Voice Woman:

George Catlin was an artist who traveled a great deal in the early American west. He painted many beautiful pictures of American Indians. Mister Catlin said the Plains Indian was the greatest horse rider the world has ever known. He said the moment an Indian rider laid a hand on his horse he became part of the animal.

Voice Man:

The buffalo and horse were extremely important to the Plains Indian. Because the horse made hunting easier, more time could be spent on things like art. The Plains Indians began to make designs on their clothing, and on special blankets their horses wore. Even common objects were painted with designs.

Voice Woman:

The coming of white settlers to the Great Plains was the beginning of the end of the buffalo and horse culture of the American Indians. Settlers did not want buffalo destroying their crops. The buffalo were killed. By the year eighteen eighty-five, the Indians of the Great Plains were mostly restricted to area of land called reservations.

Voice Man:

Many of the Great Plains tribes that survive today work hard to keep their traditional cultures. They produce art, music, and clothing. They keep alive the memory of these people who added greatly to the history of America.

Voice Woman:

This MAKING OF A NATION program was written by Paul Thompson. This is Sarah Long.

Voice Man:

And this is Rich Kleinfeldt. Join us again next week for another VOA Special English program about the history of the United States.

Let's listen

Practice on stories - American History: A Difficult Life for English Settlers

American History: A Difficult Life for English Settlers

Voice Man:

This is Rich Kleinfeldt.

Voice Woman:

And this is Sarah Long with the MAKING OF A NATION, a VOA Special English program about the history of the United States. Today, we tell about the first permanent English settlements in North America.

Voice Man:

England was the first country to compete with Spain for claims in the New World, although it was too weak to do this openly at first. But Queen Elizabeth of England supported such explorations as early as the fifteen seventies.

Sir Humphrey Gilbert led the first English settlement efforts. He did not establish any lasting settlement. He died as he was returning to England.

Gilbert's half brother Sir Walter Raleigh continued his work. Raleigh sent a number of ships to explore the east coast of North America. He called the land Virginia to honor England's unmarried Queen Elizabeth.

In fifteen eighty-five, about one-hundred men settled on Roanoke Island, off the coast of the present day state of North Carolina. These settlers returned to England a year later. Another group went to Roanoke the next year. This group included a number of women and children. But the supply ships Raleigh sent to the colony failed to arrive. When help got there in fifteen-ninety, none of the settlers could be found.

History experts still are not sure what happened. Some research suggests that at least some of the settlers became part of the Indian tribe that lived in the area.

VOICE Woman:

One reason for the delay in getting supplies to Roanoke was the attack of the Spanish Navy against England in fifteen eighty-eight. King Phillip of Spain had decided to invade England. But the small English ships combined with a fierce storm defeated the huge Spanish fleet. As a result, Spain was no longer able to block English exploration.

England discovered that supporting colonies so far away was extremely costly. So Queen Elizabeth took no more action to do this. It was not until after her death in sixteen-oh-three that England began serious efforts to start colonies in America.

Voice Man:

In sixteen-oh-six, the new English King, James the First, gave two business groups permission to establish colonies in Virginia, the area claimed by England. Companies were organized to carry out the move.

The London Company sent one hundred settlers to Virginia in sixteen-oh-six. The group landed there in May, sixteen-oh-seven and founded Jamestown. It was the first permanent English colony in the new world.

The colony seemed about to fail from the start. The settlers did not plant their crops in time so they soon had no food. Their leaders lacked the farming and building skills needed to survive on the land. More than half the settlers died during the first winter.

Voice Woman:

The businessmen controlling the colony from London knew nothing about living in such a wild place. They wanted the settlers to search for gold, and explore local rivers in hopes of finding a way to the East. One settler knew this was wrong. His name was Captain John Smith. He helped the colonists build houses and grow food by learning from the local Indians. Still, the Jamestown settlers continued to die each year from disease, lack of food and Indian attacks.

The London Company sent six thousand settlers to Virginia between sixteen-oh-six and sixteen twenty-two. More than four thousand died during that time.

Voice Man:

History experts say that all the settlers surely would have died without the help of the local Powhatan Indians. The Indians gave the settlers food. They taught them how to live in the forest. And the Powhatan Indians showed the settlers how to plant new crops and how to clear the land for building.

The settlers accepted the Indians' help. Then, however, the settlers took whatever else they wanted by force. In sixteen twenty-two, the local Indians attacked the settlers for interfering with Indian land. Three hundred forty settlers died. The colonists answered the attack by destroying the Indian tribes living along Virginia's coast.

The settlers recognized that they would have to grow their own food and survive on their own without help from England or anyone else. The Jamestown colony was clearly established by sixteen twenty-four. It was even beginning to earn money by growing and selling a new crop, tobacco.

Voice Woman:

The other early English settlements in North America were much to the north of Virginia, in the present state of Massachusetts. The people who settled there left England for different reasons than those who settled in Jamestown. The Virginia settlers were looking for ways to earn money for English businesses. The settlers in Massachusetts were seeking religious freedom.

Voice Man:

King Henry the Eighth of England had separated from the Roman Catholic Church. His daughter, Queen Elizabeth, established the Protestant religion in England. It was called the Church of England, or the Anglican Church. The Anglican Church, however, was similar to that of the Roman Catholic Church.

Not all Protestants liked this. Some wanted to leave the Anglican Church and form religious groups of their own. In sixteen-oh-six, members of one such group in the town of Scrooby did separate from the Anglican Church. About one hundred twenty-five people left England for Holland. They found problems there too, so they decided to move again...to the New World.

These people were called pilgrims, because that is the name given to people who travel for religious purposes.

Voice Woman:

About thirty-five pilgrims were among the passengers on a ship called the Mayflower in sixteen twenty. It left England to go to Virginia. But the Mayflower never reached Virginia. Instead, it landed to the north, on Cape Cod Bay. The group decided to stay there instead of trying to find Jamestown.

The pilgrims and the others on the Mayflower saw a need for rules that would help them live together peacefully. They believed they were not under English control since they did not land in Virginia. So they wrote a plan of government, called the Mayflower Compact. It was the first such plan ever developed in the New World.

They elected a man called William Bradford as the first governor of their Plymouth Colony. We know about the first thirty years of the Plymouth Colony because William Bradford described it in his book, Of Plymouth Plantation.

As happened in Jamestown, about half the settlers in Plymouth died the first winter. The survivors were surprised to find an Indian who spoke English. His name was Squanto. He had been kidnapped by an English sea captain and had lived in England before returning to his people.

The Pilgrims believed Squanto was sent to them from God. He made it possible for them to communicate with the native people. He showed them the best places to fish, what kind of crops to plant and how to grow them. He provided them with all kinds of information they needed to survive. The settlers invited the Indians to a feast in the month of November to celebrate their successes and to thank Squanto for his help. Americans remember that celebration every year when they observe the Thanksgiving holiday.

Voice Man:

Other English settlers began arriving in the area now called New England. One large group was called the Puritans. Like the pilgrims, the Puritans did not agree with the Anglican Church. But they did not want to separate from it. The Puritans wanted to change it to make it more holy. Their desire for this change made them unwelcome in England.

The first ship carrying Puritans left England for America in sixteen thirty. By the end of that summer, one thousand Puritans had landed in the northeastern part of the new country. The new English King, Charles, had given permission for them to settle the Massachusetts Bay area.

Voice Woman:

The Puritans began leaving England in large groups. Between sixteen thirty and sixteen forty, twenty thousand sailed for New England. They risked their lives on the dangerous trip. They wanted to live among people who believed as they did, people who honored the rules of the Bible. Puritans believed that the Bible was the word of God.

The Puritans and other Europeans, however, found a very different people in the New World. They were America's native Indians. That will be our story next week.

Voice Man:

This MAKING OF A NATION program was written by Nancy Steinbach. This is Rich Kleinfeldt

Voice Woman:

And this is Sarah Long. Join us again next week for another Voice of America Special English program about the history of the United States.

Let's listen