Grade 5
Social Studies
Unit: 08 Lesson: 01
Manifest Destiny
Have students observe the painting American Progress by John Gast.
Possible/optional questions for discussion may include:
• Who is the lady?
• What is she holding?
• Who does she represent?
• Look for forms of transportation.
• How about people, what are they doing, or planning to do?
• What waterways and landforms are shown?
• Why is one side of the painting light, and one side dark?
–
American Progress, by John Gast, 1872
Image credit: Gast, J. (Artist). (1872). American Progress [Web Photo]. Retrieved from
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:American_progress.JPG
©2012, TESCCC
05/02/13
page 1 of 2
Grade 5
Social Studies
Unit: 08 Lesson: 01
Possible interpretation:
The painting expresses a powerful historical idea about the meaning of America’s
westward expansion. A figure of a woman floats westward, bathed in light. She wears
the “star of an empire” on her forehead and carries in her right hand a school book of
education. She is “Columbia,” a figure often used at the time to represent the United
States. In her left hand, slender trails of telegraph wire promise to bring more
information to the west. Behind her are the great cities of the Atlantic and the light,
before her is stormy darkness and the unknown of the Pacific coast. Fleeing from all
that she brings are American Indians and all the animals such as bison, bears and
mustangs. They are afraid of what she is bringing. The painting illustrates the bias that
Americans had their own way of doing things. At the time, American expansion took
over lands, sometimes without asking. Additionally, little regard was given to the culture
and traditions of those encountered. The individual Indians flee on foot preceding the
tall ships, the covered wagons, the overland stage and the three railroad lines. The
Pony Express and the telegraph lines are the technology of communication. The groups
of human figures, read from left to right, convey much the same idea. American Indian
tribes preceded explorers and prospectors, who in turn come before the farmers and
settlers. The idea of progress coming from the East to the West, and the notion that the
frontier would be developed by sequential waves of people was deeply rooted in
American thought.
Manifest Destiny: as a concept was spoken of early on by Andrew Jackson. He was
from Tennessee and was famous for his brave fighting during the War of 1812 in the
Battle of New Orleans. Nicknamed “Old Hickory”, he became the 7 th President in 1829.
He spoke about “extending the area of freedom” which meant claiming for the United
States more of the lands west toward the Pacific Ocean. His idea demonstrated
Americans’ budding sense of self-identity and expansionism. Citizens were beginning to
think of the United States as deserving of more land for places to help spread liberty
and justice to more people.
In 1845, a journalist named John O’Sullivan wrote an essay urging the United States to
annex the Republic of Texas because it was “our manifest destiny to overspread the
continent…for the free development of our yearly multiplying millions.” O’Sullivan used
the term in the New York Morning News arguing that the United States had the right to
claim “the whole of Oregon…by the right of our manifest destiny…which Providence has
given us for the great experiment of liberty…”
©2012, TESCCC
05/02/13
page 2 of 2