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| A Picture of Amherst in the 1800's |
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The year Emily Dickinson was born marked the passage of the Indian Removal Act. That allowed Eastern Indians to move into
Western lands. In 1833, the Female Anti- Slavery Society was organized. Andrew Jackson served as president of the United States
for two consecutive terms. When Martin Van Buren was elected a Panic emerged in 1837. This time period would be called the
Gilded Age, when the term “Manifest Destiny” was a way of life. In the 1840’s Texas joined the United States
as the 28th states and the U.S. started a war with Mexico. In 1862, the Homestead Act was passed, which allowed people to
buy 160 acres of land if they settled on it for 5 years. Railroads were prominent and the oil business was lucrative. In 1876,
Thomas Edison invented the light bulb, the buffalo were nearing extinction, and the National Baseball League played its first
game. The year Emily died in 1886, the Haymarket Square Riot occurred which led to the Anarchism scare. The nineteenth-century
transformed the United States. The west was rapidly being populated and the growth f transportation as quick. Communication
was growing and major cities were being overpopulated. This century also witnessed a destruction of forests and battles over
land and seas. American kids were learning to fight and become a world power. American woman in the early nineteenth century
were referred to as the frugal housewives. Traditional roles were being questioned as woman realized they are serving as the
brains behind the operation. Religion and Piety were being questioned as woman wanted to drop traditional roles and be equal
with men. Women played important roles in religious and social reforms. They led missions, societies, abolitions, and temperance.
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