title: American frontier

text: American attitudes towards Natives during this period ranged from malevolence ("the only good Indian is a dead Indian") to misdirected humanitarianism (Indians live in "inferior" societies and by assimilation into white society they can be redeemed) to somewhat realistic (Native Americans and settlers could co-exist in separate but equal societies, dividing up the remaining western land). Dealing with nomadic tribes complicated the reservation strategy and decentralized tribal power made treaty making difficult among the Plains Indians. Conflicts erupted in the 1850s, resulting in various Indian wars. In these times of conflict, Natives become more stringent about white men entering their territory. Such as in the case of Oliver Loving, they would sometimes attack cowboys and their cattle if ever caught crossing in the borders of their land. They would also prey upon livestock if the food was scarce during hard times. However, the relationship between cowboys and Native Americans were more mutual than they are portrayed, and the former would occasionally pay a fine of 10 cents per cow for the latter to allow them to travel through their land. Natives also preyed upon stagecoaches travelling in the frontier for its horses and valuables.


title: American frontier

text: After the Civil War, as the volunteer armies disbanded, the regular army cavalry regiments increased in number from six to ten, among them Custer's U.S. 7th Cavalry Regiment of Little Bighorn fame, and the African-American U.S. 9th Cavalry Regiment and U.S. 10th Cavalry Regiment. The black units, along with others (both cavalry and infantry), collectively became known as the Buffalo Soldiers. According to Robert M. Utley:


title: American frontier

text: Westerners were proud of their leadership in the movement for democracy and equality, a major theme for Frederick Jackson Turner. The new states of Kentucky, Tennessee, Alabama, and Ohio were more democratic than the parent states back East in terms of politics and society. The Western states were the first to give women the right to vote. By 1900 the West, especially California and Oregon, led the Progressive movement.


title: American frontier

text: Scholars have examined the social history of the west in search of the American character. The history of Kansas, argued historian Carl L. Becker a century ago, reflects American ideals. He wrote: "The Kansas spirit is the American spirit double distilled. It is a new grafted product of American individualism, American idealism, American intolerance. Kansas is America in microcosm."


title: American frontier

text: Scholars have compared the emergence of democracy in America with other countries, regarding the frontier experience. Selwyn Troen has made the comparison with Israel. The American frontiersmen relied on individual effort, in the context of very large quantities of unsettled land with weak external enemies. Israel by contrast, operated in a very small geographical zone, surrounded by more powerful neighbors. The Jewish pioneer was not building an individual or family enterprise, but was a conscious participant in nation-building, with a high priority on collective and cooperative planned settlements. The Israeli pioneers brought in American experts on irrigation and agriculture to provide technical advice. However, they rejected the American frontier model in favor of a European model that supported their political and security concerns.


title: American frontier

text: The cities played an essential role in the development of the frontier, as transportation hubs, financial and communications centers, and providers of merchandise, services, and entertainment. As the railroads pushed westward into the unsettled territory after 1860, they build service towns to handle the needs of railroad construction crews, train crews, and passengers who ate meals at scheduled stops. In most of the South, there were very few cities of any size for miles around, and this pattern held for Texas as well, so railroads did not arrive until the 1880s. They then shipped the cattle out and cattle drives became short-distance affairs. However, the passenger trains were often the targets of armed gangs.


title: American frontier

text: Denver's economy before 1870 had been rooted in mining; it then grew by expanding its role in railroads, wholesale trade, manufacturing, food processing, and servicing the growing agricultural and ranching hinterland. Between 1870 and 1890, manufacturing output soared from $600,000 to $40 million, and the population grew by a factor of 20 times to 107,000. Denver had always attracted miners, workers, whores, and travelers. Saloons and gambling dens sprung up overnight. The city fathers boasted of its fine theaters, and especially the Tabor Grand Opera House built in 1881. By 1890, Denver had grown to be the 26th largest city in America, and the fifth-largest city west of the Mississippi River. The boom times attracted millionaires and their mansions, as well as hustlers, poverty, and crime. Denver gained regional notoriety with its range of bawdy houses, from the sumptuous quarters of renowned madams to the squalid "cribs" located a few blocks away. Business was good; visitors spent lavishly, then left town. As long as madams conducted their business discreetly, and "crib girls" did not advertise their availability too crudely, authorities took their bribes and looked the other way. Occasional cleanups and crack downs satisfied the demands for reform.


title: American frontier

text: With its giant mountain of copper, Butte, Montana, was the largest, richest, and rowdiest mining camp on the frontier. It was an ethnic stronghold, with the Irish Catholics in control of politics and of the best jobs at the leading mining corporation Anaconda Copper. City boosters opened a public library in 1894. Ring argues that the library was originally a mechanism of social control, "an antidote to the miners' proclivity for drinking, whoring, and gambling". It was also designed to promote middle-class values and to convince Easterners that Butte was a cultivated city.


title: American frontier

text: European immigrants often built communities of similar religious and ethnic backgrounds. For example, many Finns went to Minnesota and Michigan, Swedes and Norwegians to Minnesota and the Dakotas, Irish to railroad centers along the transcontinental lines, Volga Germans to North Dakota, and German Jews to Portland, Oregon.


title: American frontier

text: African Americans moved West as soldiers, as well as cowboys, farmhands, saloon workers, cooks, and outlaws. The Buffalo Soldiers were soldiers in the all-black 9th and 10th Cavalry regiments, and 24th and 25th Infantry Regiments of the U.S. Army. They had white officers and served in numerous western forts.


title: American frontier

text: About 4,000 black people came to California in Gold Rush days. In 1879, after the end of Reconstruction in the South, several thousand Freedmen moved from Southern states to Kansas. Known as the Exodusters, they were lured by the prospect of good, cheap Homestead Law land and better treatment. The all-black town of Nicodemus, Kansas, which was founded in 1877, was an organized settlement that predates the Exodusters but is often associated with them.


title: American frontier

text: The California Gold Rush included thousands of Mexican and Chinese arrivals. Chinese migrants, many of whom were impoverished peasants, provided the major part of the workforce for the building of the Central Pacific portion of the transcontinental railroad. Most of them went home by 1870 when the railroad was finished. Those who stayed on worked in mining, agriculture, and opened small shops such as groceries, laundries, and restaurants. Hostility against the Chinese remained high in the western states/territories as seen by the Chinese Massacre Cove episode and the Rock Springs massacre. The Chinese were generally forced into self-sufficient "Chinatowns" in cities such as San Francisco, Portland, Seattle, and Los Angeles. In Los Angeles, the last major anti-Chinese riot took place in 1871, after which local law enforcement grew stronger. In the late 19th century, Chinatowns were squalid slums known for their vice, prostitution, drugs, and violent battles between "tongs". By the 1930s, however, Chinatowns had become clean, safe and attractive tourist destinations.


title: American frontier

text: The first Japanese arrived in the U.S. in 1869, with the arrival of 22 people from samurai families, settling in Placer County, California, to establish the Wakamatsu Tea and Silk Farm Colony. Japanese were recruited to work on plantations in Hawaii, beginning in 1885. By the late 19th Century, more Japanese emigrated to Hawaii and the American mainland. The Issei, or first-generation Japanese immigrants, were not allowed to become U.S. citizens because they were not "a free white person", per the United States Naturalization Law of 1790. This did not change until the passage of the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952, known as the McCarran-Walter Act, which allowed Japanese immigrants to become naturalized U.S. citizens.


title: American frontier

text: By 1920, Japanese American farmers produced US$67 million worth of crops, more than ten percent of California's total crop value. There were 111,000 Japanese Americans in the U.S., of which 82,000 were immigrants and 29,000 were U.S. born. Congress passed the Immigration Act of 1924 effectively ending all Japanese immigration to the U.S. The U.S.-born children of the Issei were citizens, in accordance to the 14th Amendment to the United States Constitution.


title: American frontier

text: The great majority of Hispanics who had been living in the former territories of New Spain remained and became American citizens in 1848. The 10,000 or so Californios also became U.S. citizens. They lived in southern California and after 1880 were overshadowed by the hundreds of thousands of new arrivals from the eastern states. Those in New Mexico dominated towns and villages that changed little until well into the 20th century. New arrivals from Mexico arrived, especially after the Revolution of 1911 terrorized thousands of villages all across Mexico. Most refugees went to Texas or California, and soon poor barrios appeared in many border towns. The California "Robin Hood", Joaquin Murrieta, led a gang in the 1850s which burned houses, killed exploiting miners, robbed stagecoaches of landowners and fought against violence and discrimination against Latin Americans. In Texas, Juan Cortina led a 20-year campaign against Anglos and the Texas Rangers, starting around 1859.


title: American frontier

text: On the Great Plains very few single men attempted to operate a farm or ranch; farmers clearly understood the need for a hard-working wife, and numerous children, to handle the many chores, including child-rearing, feeding, and clothing the family, managing the housework, and feeding the hired hands. During the early years of settlement, farm women played an integral role in assuring family survival by working outdoors. After a generation or so, women increasingly left the fields, thus redefining their roles within the family. New conveniences such as sewing and washing machines encouraged women to turn to domestic roles. The scientific housekeeping movement, promoted across the land by the media and government extension agents, as well as county fairs which featured achievements in home cookery and canning, advice columns for women in the farm papers, and home economics courses in the schools all contributed to this trend.


title: American frontier

text: Although the eastern image of farm life on the prairies emphasizes the isolation of the lonely farmer and farm life, in reality, rural folk created a rich social life for themselves. They often sponsored activities that combined work, food, and entertainment such as barn raisings, corn huskings, quilting bees, Grange meetings, church activities, and school functions. The womenfolk organized shared meals and potluck events, as well as extended visits between families.


title: American frontier

text: Childhood on the American frontier is contested territory. One group of scholars, following the lead of novelists Willa Cather and Laura Ingalls Wilder, argue the rural environment was beneficial to the child's upbringing. Historians Katherine Harris and Elliott West write that rural upbringing allowed children to break loose from urban hierarchies of age and gender, promoted family interdependence, and at the end produced children who were more self-reliant, mobile, adaptable, responsible, independent and more in touch with nature than their urban or eastern counterparts. On the other hand, historians Elizabeth Hampsten and Lillian Schlissel offer a grim portrait of loneliness, privation, abuse, and demanding physical labor from an early age. Riney-Kehrberg takes a middle position.


title: American frontier

text: Entrepreneurs set up shops and businesses to cater to the miners. World-famous were the houses of prostitution found in every mining camp worldwide. Prostitution was a growth industry attracting sex workers from around the globe, pulled in by the money, despite the harsh and dangerous working conditions and low prestige. Chinese women were frequently sold by their families and taken to the camps as prostitutes; they had to send their earnings back to the family in China. In Virginia City, Nevada, a prostitute, Julia Bulette, was one of the few who achieved "respectable" status. She nursed victims of an influenza epidemic; this gave her acceptance in the community and the support of the sheriff. The townspeople were shocked when she was murdered in 1867; they gave her a lavish funeral and speedily tried and hanged her assailant. Until the 1890s, madams predominantly ran the businesses, after which male pimps took over, and the treatment of the women generally declined. It was not uncommon for bordellos in Western towns to operate openly, without the stigma of East Coast cities. Gambling and prostitution were central to life in these western towns, and only later—as the female population increased, reformers moved in, and other civilizing influences arrived—did prostitution become less blatant and less common. After a decade or so the mining towns attracted respectable women who ran boarding houses, organized church societies, worked as laundresses and seamstresses and strove for independent status.


title: American frontier

text: Whenever a new settlement or mining camp started one of the first buildings or tents erected would be a gambling hall. As the population grew, gambling halls were typically the largest and most ornately decorated buildings in any town and often housed a bar, stage for entertainment, and hotel rooms for guests. These establishments were a driving force behind the local economy and many towns measured their prosperity by the number of gambling halls and professional gamblers they had. Towns that were friendly to gambling were typically known to sports as "wide-awake" or "wide-open". Cattle towns in Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, and Nebraska became famous centers of gambling. The cowboys had been accumulating their wages and postponing their pleasures until they finally arrived in town with money to wager. Abilene, Dodge City, Wichita, Omaha, and Kansas City all had an atmosphere that was convivial to gaming. Such an atmosphere also invited trouble and such towns also developed reputations as lawless and dangerous places.


title: American frontier

text: Historian Waddy W. Moore uses court records to show that on the sparsely settled Arkansas frontier lawlessness was common. He distinguished two types of crimes: unprofessional (dueling, crimes of drunkenness, selling whiskey to the Natives, cutting trees on federal land) and professional (rustling, highway robbery, counterfeiting). Criminals found many opportunities to rob pioneer families of their possessions, while the few underfunded lawmen had great difficulty detecting, arresting, holding, and convicting wrongdoers. Bandits, typically in groups of two or three, rarely attacked stagecoaches with a guard carrying a sawed-off, double-barreled shotgun; it proved less risky to rob teamsters, people on foot, and solitary horsemen, while bank robberies themselves were harder to pull off due to the security of the establishment. According to historian Brian Robb, the earliest form of organized crime in America was born from the gangs of the Old West.


title: American frontier

text: When criminals were convicted, the punishment was severe. Aside from the occasional Western sheriff and Marshal, there were other various law enforcement agencies throughout the American frontier, such as the Texas Rangers. These lawmen were not just instrumental in keeping the peace, but also in protecting the locals from Native and Mexican threats at the border. Law enforcement tended to be more stringent in towns than in rural areas. Law enforcement emphasized maintaining stability more than armed combat, focusing on drunkenness, disarming cowboys who violated gun-control edicts and dealing with flagrant breaches of gambling and prostitution ordinances.


title: American frontier

text: Dykstra argues that the violent image of the cattle towns in film and fiction is largely a myth. The real Dodge City, he says, was the headquarters for the buffalo-hide trade of the Southern Plains and one of the West's principal cattle towns, a sale and shipping point for cattle arriving from Texas. He states there is a "second Dodge City" that belongs to the popular imagination and thrives as a cultural metaphor for violence, chaos, and depravity. For the cowboy arriving with money in hand after two months on the trail, the town was exciting. A contemporary eyewitness of Hays City, Kansas, paints a vivid image of this cattle town:


title: American frontier

text: It has been acknowledged that the popular portrayal of Dodge City in film and fiction carries a note of truth, however, as gun crime was rampant in the city before the establishment of a local government. Soon after the city's residents officially established their first municipal government, however, a law banning concealed firearms was enacted and crime was reduced soon afterward. Similar laws were passed in other frontier towns to reduce the rate of gun crime as well. As UCLA law professor Adam Wrinkler noted:


title: American frontier

text: Tombstone, Arizona, was a turbulent mining town that flourished longer than most, from 1877 to 1929. Silver was discovered in 1877, and by 1881 the town had a population of over 10,000. In 1879 the newly arrived Earp brothers bought shares in the Vizina mine, water rights, and gambling concessions, but Virgil, Wyatt, and Morgan Earp obtained positions at different times as federal and local lawmen. After more than a year of threats and feuding, they, along with Doc Holliday, killed three outlaws in the Gunfight at the O.K. Corral, the most famous gunfight of the Old West. In the aftermath, Virgil Earp was maimed in an ambush, and Morgan Earp was assassinated while playing billiards. Wyatt and others, including his brothers James Earp and Warren Earp, pursued those they believed responsible in an extra-legal vendetta and warrants were issued for their arrest in the murder of Frank Stilwell. The Cochise County Cowboys were one of the first organized crime syndicates in the United States, and their demise came at the hands of Wyatt Earp.


title: American frontier

text: Western story tellers and film makers featured the gunfight in many Western productions. Walter Noble Burns's novel "Tombstone" (1927) made Earp famous. Hollywood celebrated Earp's Tombstone days with John Ford's "My Darling Clementine" (1946), John Sturges's "Gunfight at the O.K. Corral" (1957) and "Hour of the Gun" (1967), Frank Perry's "Doc" (1971), George Cosmatos's "Tombstone" (1993), and Lawrence Kasdan's "Wyatt Earp" (1994). They solidified Earp's modern reputation as the Old West's deadliest gunman.


title: American frontier

text: The major type of banditry was conducted by the infamous outlaws of the West, including the James–Younger Gang, Billy the Kid, the Dalton Gang, Black Bart, Sam Bass, Butch Cassidy's Wild Bunch, and hundreds of others who preyed on banks, trains, stagecoaches, and in some cases even armed government transports such as the Wham Paymaster robbery and the Skeleton Canyon robbery. Some of the outlaws, such as Jesse James, were products of the violence of the Civil War (James had ridden with Quantrill's Raiders) and others became outlaws during hard times in the cattle industry. Many were misfits and drifters who roamed the West avoiding the law. In rural areas Joaquin Murieta, Jack Powers, Augustine Chacon and other bandits terrorized the state. When outlaw gangs were near, towns would occasionally raise a posse to drive them out or capture them. Seeing that the need to combat the bandits was a growing business opportunity, Allan Pinkerton ordered his National Detective Agency, founded in 1850, to open branches in the West, and they got into the business of pursuing and capturing outlaws. To take refuge from the law, outlaws would use the advantages of the open range, remote passes, and badlands to hide. While some settlements and towns in the frontier also house outlaws and criminals, which were called "outlaw towns".


title: American frontier

text: Banditry was a major issue in California after 1849, as thousands of young men detached from family or community moved into a land with few law enforcement mechanisms. To combat this, the San Francisco Committee of Vigilance was established to give drumhead trials and death sentences to well-known offenders. As such, other earlier settlements created their private agencies to protect communities due to the lack of peace-keeping establishments. These vigilance committees reflected different occupations in the frontier, such as land clubs, cattlemen's associations and mining camps. Similar vigilance committees also existed in Texas, and their main objective was to stamp out lawlessness and rid communities of desperadoes and rustlers. These committees would sometimes form mob rule for private vigilante groups, but usually were made up of responsible citizens who wanted only to maintain order. Criminals caught by these vigilance committees were treated cruelly; often hung or shot without any form of trial.


title: American frontier

text: Civilians also took arms to defend themselves in the Old West, sometimes siding with lawmen (Coffeyville Bank Robbery), or siding with outlaws (Battle of Ingalls). In the Post-Civil War frontier, over 523 whites, 34 blacks, and 75 others were victims of lynching. However, cases of lynching in the Old West wasn't primarily caused by the absence of a legal system, but also because of social class. Historian Michael J. Pfeifer writes, "Contrary to the popular understanding, early territorial lynching did not flow from an absence or distance of law enforcement but rather from the social instability of early communities and their contest for property, status, and the definition of social order."


title: American frontier

text: Range wars were infamous armed conflicts that took place in the "open range" of the American frontier. The subject of these conflicts was the control of lands freely used for farming and cattle grazing which gave the conflict its name. Range wars became more common by the end of the American Civil War, and numerous conflicts were fought such as the Pleasant Valley War, Johnson County War, Pecos War, Mason County War, Colorado Range War, Fence Cutting War, Colfax County War, Castaic Range War, Spring Creek raid, Porum Range War, Barber–Mizell feud, San Elizario Salt War and others. During a range war in Montana, a vigilante group called Stuart's Stranglers, which were made up of cattlemen and cowboys, killed up to 20 criminals and range squatters in 1884 alone. In Nebraska, stock grower Isom Olive led a range war in 1878 that killed a number of homesteaders from lynchings and shootouts before eventually leading to his own murder. Another infamous type of open range conflict were the Sheep Wars, which were fought between sheep ranchers and cattle ranchers over grazing rights and mainly occurred in Texas, Arizona and the border region of Wyoming and Colorado. In most cases, formal military involvement were used to quickly put an end to these conflicts. Other conflicts over land and territory were also fought such as the Regulator–Moderator War, Cortina Troubles, Las Cuevas War and the Bandit War.


title: American frontier

text: Feuds involving families and bloodlines also occurred much in the frontier. Since private agencies and vigilance committees were the substitute for proper courts, many families initially depended on themselves and their communities for their security and justice. These wars include the Lincoln County War, Tutt–Everett War, Flynn–Doran feud, Early–Hasley feud, Brooks-Baxter War, Sutton–Taylor feud, Horrell Brothers feud, Brooks–McFarland Feud, Reese–Townsend feud and the Earp Vendetta Ride.


title: American frontier

text: The end of the bison herds opened up millions of acres for cattle ranching. Spanish cattlemen had introduced cattle ranching and longhorn cattle to the Southwest in the 17th century, and the men who worked the ranches, called "vaqueros", were the first "cowboys" in the West. After the Civil War, Texas ranchers raised large herds of longhorn cattle. The nearest railheads were 800 or more miles (1300+ km) north in Kansas (Abilene, Kansas City, Dodge City, and Wichita). So once fattened, the ranchers and their cowboys drove the herds north along the Western, Chisholm, and Shawnee trails. The cattle were shipped to Chicago, St. Louis, and points east for slaughter and consumption in the fast-growing cities. The Chisholm Trail, laid out by cattleman Joseph McCoy along an old trail marked by Jesse Chisholm, was the major artery of cattle commerce, carrying over 1.5 million head of cattle between 1867 and 1871 over the from south Texas to Abilene, Kansas. The long drives were treacherous, especially crossing water such as the Brazos and the Red River and when they had to fend off Natives and rustlers looking to make off with their cattle. A typical drive would take three to four months and contained two miles (3 km) of cattle six abreast. Despite the risks, a successful drive proved very profitable to everyone involved, as the price of one steer was $4 in Texas and $40 in the East.


title: American frontier

text: By the 1870s and 1880s, cattle ranches expanded further north into new grazing grounds and replaced the bison herds in Wyoming, Montana, Colorado, Nebraska, and the Dakota territory, using the rails to ship to both coasts. Many of the largest ranches were owned by Scottish and English financiers. The single largest cattle ranch in the entire West was owned by American John W. Iliff, "cattle king of the Plains", operating in Colorado and Wyoming. Gradually, longhorns were replaced by the British breeds of Hereford and Angus, introduced by settlers from the Northwest. Though less hardy and more disease-prone, these breeds produced better-tasting beef and matured faster.


title: American frontier

text: The funding for the cattle industry came largely from British sources, as the European investors engaged in a speculative extravaganza—a "bubble". Graham concludes the mania was founded on genuine opportunity, as well as "exaggeration, gullibility, inadequate communications, dishonesty, and incompetence". A severe winter engulfed the plains toward the end of 1886 and well into 1887, locking the prairie grass under ice and crusted snow which starving herds could not penetrate. The British lost most of their money—as did eastern investors like Theodore Roosevelt, but their investments did create a large industry that continues to cycle through boom and bust periods.


title: American frontier

text: On a much smaller scale, sheep grazing was locally popular; sheep were easier to feed and needed less water. However, Americans did not eat mutton. As farmers moved in open range cattle ranching came to an end and was replaced by barbed wire spreads where water, breeding, feeding, and grazing could be controlled. This led to "fence wars" which erupted over disputes about water rights.


title: American frontier

text: Anchoring the booming cattle industry of the 1860s and 1870s were the cattle towns in Kansas and Missouri. Like the mining towns in California and Nevada, cattle towns such as Abilene, Dodge City, and Ellsworth experienced a short period of boom and bust lasting about five years. The cattle towns would spring up as land speculators would rush in ahead of a proposed rail line and build a town and the supporting services attractive to the cattlemen and the cowboys. If the railroads complied, the new grazing ground and supporting town would secure the cattle trade. However, unlike the mining towns which in many cases became ghost towns and ceased to exist after the ore played out, cattle towns often evolved from cattle to farming and continued after the grazing lands were exhausted.


title: American frontier

text: The concern with the protection of the environment became a new issue in the late 19th century, pitting different interests. On the one side were the lumber and coal companies who called for maximum exploitation of natural resources to maximize jobs, economic growth, and their own profit.


title: American frontier

text: In the center were the conservationists, led by Theodore Roosevelt and his coalition of outdoorsmen, sportsmen, bird watchers, and scientists. They wanted to reduce waste; emphasized the value of natural beauty for tourism and ample wildlife for hunters; and argued that careful management would not only enhance these goals but also increase the long-term economic benefits to society by planned harvesting and environmental protections. Roosevelt worked his entire career to put the issue high on the national agenda. He was deeply committed to conserving natural resources. He worked closely with Gifford Pinchot and used the Newlands Reclamation Act of 1902 to promote federal construction of dams to irrigate small farms and placed 230 million acres (360,000 mi or 930,000 km) under federal protection. Roosevelt set aside more Federal land, national parks, and nature preserves than all of his predecessors combined.


title: American frontier

text: The third element, smallest at first but growing rapidly after 1870, were the environmentalists who honored nature for its own sake, and rejected the goal of maximizing human benefits. Their leader was John Muir (1838–1914), a widely read author and naturalist and pioneer advocate of preservation of wilderness for its own sake, and founder of the Sierra Club. Muir, based in California, in 1889 started organizing support to preserve the sequoias in the Yosemite Valley; Congress did pass the Yosemite National Park bill (1890). In 1897 President Grover Cleveland created thirteen protected forests but lumber interests had Congress cancel the move. Muir, taking the persona of an Old Testament prophet, crusaded against the lumberman, portraying it as a contest "between landscape righteousness and the devil". A master publicist, Muir's magazine articles, in "Harper's Weekly" (June 5, 1897) and the "Atlantic Monthly" turned the tide of public sentiment. He mobilized public opinion to support Roosevelt's program of setting aside national monuments, national forest reserves, and national parks. However, Muir broke with Roosevelt and especially President William Howard Taft on the Hetch Hetchy dam, which was built in the Yosemite National Park to supply water to San Francisco. Biographer Donald Worster says, "Saving the American soul from a total surrender to materialism was the cause for which he fought."


title: American frontier

text: The rise of the cattle industry and the cowboy is directly tied to the demise of the huge herds of bison—usually called the "buffalo". Once numbering over 25 million on the Great Plains, the grass-eating herds were a vital resource animal for the Plains Indians, providing food, hides for clothing and shelter, and bones for implements. Loss of habitat, disease, and over-hunting steadily reduced the herds through the 19th century to the point of near extinction. The last 10–15 million died out in a decade 1872–1883; only 100 survived. The tribes that depended on the buffalo had little choice but to accept the government offer of reservations, where the government would feed and supply them. Conservationists founded the American Bison Society in 1905; it lobbied Congress to establish public bison herds. Several national parks in the U.S. and Canada were created, in part to provide a sanctuary for bison and other large wildlife. The bison population reached 500,000 by 2003.


title: American frontier

text: Following the 1890 U.S. census, the superintendent announced that there was no longer a clear line of advancing settlement, and hence no longer a contiguous frontier in the continental United States. When examining the later 1900 U.S. census results though, the contiguous frontier line does remain. But by the 1910 U.S. census, only pockets of the frontier remain without a clear westward line, allowing travel across the continent without ever crossing a frontier line.


title: American frontier

text: Virgin farmland was increasingly hard to find after 1890—although the railroads advertised some in eastern Montana. Bicha shows that nearly 600,000 American farmers sought cheap land by moving to the Prairie frontier of the Canadian West from 1897 to 1914. However, about two-thirds of them grew disillusioned and returned to the U.S. The Homestead Acts and proliferation of railroads are often credited as being important factors in shrinking the frontier, by efficiently bringing in settlers and required infrastructure. Barbed wire is also reasoned to reduce the traditional open range. In addition, the eventual adoption of automobiles and their required network of adequate roads solidified the frontier's end.


title: American frontier

text: The admission of Oklahoma as a state in 1907 upon the combination of the Oklahoma Territory and the last remaining Indian Territory, and the Arizona and New Mexico territories as states in 1912, marks the end of the frontier story for many scholars. Due to their low and uneven populations during this period though, frontier territory remained for the meantime. Of course, a few typical frontier episodes still happened such as the last stagecoach robbery occurred in Nevada's remaining frontier in December 1916.


title: American frontier

text: The Mexican Revolution also lead to significant conflict reaching across the US-Mexico border which was still mostly within frontier territory, known as the Mexican Border War (1910–1919). Flashpoints included the Battle of Columbus (1916) and the Punitive Expedition (1916–1917). The Bandit War (1915–1919) involved attacks targeted against Texan settlers. Also, a few minor fights involving Natives happened as late as the Bluff War (1914–1915) and the Posey War (1923).


title: American frontier

text: Alaska was not admitted as a state until 1959. The ethos and storyline of the "American frontier" had passed.


title: American frontier

text: Central to the myth and the reality of the West is the American cowboy. His real life was a hard one and revolved around two annual roundups, spring and fall, the subsequent drives to market, and the time off in the cattle towns spending his hard-earned money on food, clothing, firearms, gambling, and prostitution. During winter, many cowboys hired themselves out to ranches near the cattle towns, where they repaired and maintained equipment and buildings. Working the cattle was not just a routine job but also a lifestyle that exulted in the freedom of the wide unsettled outdoors on horseback. Long drives hired one cowboy for about 250 head of cattle. Saloons were ubiquitous (outside Mormondom), but on the trail, the cowboys were forbidden to drink alcohol. Often, hired cowboys were trained and knowledgeable in their trade such as herding, ranching and protecting cattle. To protect their herd from wild animals, hostile Natives, and rustlers, cowboys carried with them their iconic weaponry such as the Bowie knife, lasso, bullwhip, pistols, rifles, and shotguns.


title: American frontier

text: Many of the cowboys were veterans of the Civil War; a diverse group, they included Blacks, Hispanics, Native Americans, and immigrants from many lands. The earliest cowboys in Texas learned their trade, adapted their clothing, and took their jargon from the Mexican vaqueros or "buckaroos", the heirs of Spanish cattlemen from the middle-south of Spain. Chaps, the heavy protective leather trousers worn by cowboys, got their name from the Spanish "chaparreras", and the lariat, or rope, was derived from "la reata". All the distinct clothing of the cowboy—boots, saddles, hats, pants, chaps, slickers, bandannas, gloves, and collar-less shirts—were practical and adaptable, designed for protection and comfort. The cowboy hat quickly developed the capability, even in the early years, to identify its wearer as someone associated with the West; it came to symbolize the frontier. The most enduring fashion adapted from the cowboy, popular nearly worldwide today, are "blue jeans", originally made by Levi Strauss for miners in 1850.


title: American frontier

text: Before a drive, a cowboy's duties included riding out on the range and bringing together the scattered cattle. The best cattle would be selected, roped, and branded, and most male cattle were castrated. The cattle also needed to be dehorned and examined and treated for infections. On the long drives, the cowboys had to keep the cattle moving and in line. The cattle had to be watched day and night as they were prone to stampedes and straying. While camping every night, cowboys would often sing to their herd to keep them calm. The workdays often lasted fourteen hours, with just six hours of sleep. It was grueling, dusty work, with just a few minutes of relaxation before and at the end of a long day. On the trail, drinking, gambling, and brawling were often prohibited and fined, and sometimes cursing as well. It was monotonous and boring work, with food to match: bacon, beans, bread, coffee, dried fruit, and potatoes. On average, cowboys earned $30 to $40 per month, because of the heavy physical and emotional toll, it was unusual for a cowboy to spend more than seven years on the range. As open range ranching and the long drives gave way to fenced-in ranches in the 1880s, by the 1890s the glory days of the cowboy came to an end, and the myths about the "free-living" cowboy began to emerge.


title: American frontier

text: In 1849, James W. Marshall was building a sawmill on the riverside of the American River when he noticed metal flakes under the waterwheel. He recognized the flakes to be gold. However, the sawmill he was building was not his, meaning that when he finished building the sawmill, his client John Sutter would also notice. So word quickly spread of there potentially being gold in the American River. So everyone packed the essentials, hopped on their wagons, and headed down the Chilkoot Trail in order to strike it rich. This was the start of the California Gold Rush. The California Gold Rush was both good and bad to America at the time. It simultaneously increased the population of California to almost 100,000 people, which helped with the modernization of California. But also brought down the population of other states. Their employment rate took a hit as well, as people were quitting their jobs so they could embark on their journeys. The California Gold Rush finally came to an end in 1855. The extraction of gold from the river was done by dust panning; with most dust panning normally done by prospectors. Dust panning involves using a pan into the water to collect sediment from the steambed, then pours the water out leaving all the gold and other sediments behind. Though this happened before the Wild West era, it was one of the biggest reasons why the Wild West was a thing in the first place.


title: American frontier

text: Even after the California Gold Rush, mining was still a common occupation. Most mountainside towns likely had a mineshaft. Most miners were poor, as mining was a very labor-intensive job. Miners would use pickaxes in order to mine into the mountains. They mined gold, zinc, copper, and other metals. These metals were sold to shopkeepers and rich people for currency. Miners were paid a salary of $1.70 per day.


title: American frontier

text: Laws were less restrictive in the West for white women. Western states allowed women to vote long before the eastern states did and had more liberal divorce laws. Minority women did not experience the same freedoms. Native women were forced onto reservations, but still tried to maintain their ways of life and support their families. Chinese women immigrated to work in the laundries, inns, and saloons of mining camps. Some were sold to work in mining camps by their impoverished families in China. Some women were also forced to work in the sex industry.


title: American frontier

text: The main occupation of women was running the household and raising children. Tasks included cooking, cleaning, making clothes, gardening, and helping out on the farm. Sometimes women were the sole operators of farms. Women were also entrepreneurs, running saloons, boarding houses, laundries, and inns. Independent women earned a living through teaching or sex work. In towns with male-dominated industries such as logging and mining, the gender imbalance led to different roles for women. Women were paid for domestic work that was traditionally unpaid.


title: American frontier

text: Some women also worked in predominantly male positions; there were cowgirls, female business owners, female gunslingers and female bounty hunters.


title: American frontier

text: Being a lumberjack was a labor-intensive occupation. The job was a fairly common occupation to have in this era, similarly to miners and railroad workers, many people pursued these careers, but was ultimately very dangerous. Loggers were paid more than both miners and railroaders combined, making $3.20 every day.


title: American frontier

text: To cut down trees, lumberjacks had many tools to help them in the process. To cut down trees, they would send multiple loggers depending on the size of the tree. From there, they would use double-sided axes to chop the base of the tree. After the tree collapsed, if the tree was too big to chop with the double-sided axes, they would use a gigantic saw called a crosscut. These saws could be over 12 feet in length.


title: American frontier

text: And for transportation, they would either float the logs down a river (a profession known as log driving), or use a high-wheel loader to lift the massive logs that were strapped together using rope. Another rope was tied to oxen, then the oxen would pull the logs to wherever they needed to be.


title: American frontier

text: The frontiersmen were the explorers of the Old West. In 1803, Thomas Jefferson closed the deal of the Louisiana Purchase for 15 million dollars. With the 828,000 square miles of gained territory. He sent Meriwether Lewis and William Clark along with 45 other men to go explore the new territory. Their expedition across the Western United States turned into the famous Lewis and Clark Expedition There were many dangers on the trail; they had to travel up, portage and ford rivers, suffer injuries, epidemics, famine, and fend off grizzly bears and hostile Native American tribes. The Lewis and Clark expedition did take place before the Wild West era, but it was a major event in United States history, and was one of the main reasons the Wild West era began.


title: American frontier

text: Besides Lewis and Clark, the Wild West era brought many other frontiersmen. They were very self-sufficient compared to normal townspeople. They cleared their own land, built their own shelter, and farmed and foraged for their food. Their nomadic lifestyle was hurtful for America's economy, as unemployment made it difficult for more money to go into circulation, and stores were going bankrupt from a lack of customers. This also caused territorial disputes with the Native Americans. For example; Charles Bent's arrival into Colorado caused the Taos Revolt. Bent shortly died from an assault from multiple Pueblo warriors.


title: American frontier

text: The names and exploits of Western gunslingers took a major role in American folklore, fiction and film. Their guns and costumes became children's toys for make-believe shootouts. The stories became immensely popular in Germany and other European countries, which produced their novels and films about the American frontier. The image of a Wild West filled with countless gunfights was a myth based on repeated exaggerations. Actual gunfights in the Old West were more episodic rather than being a common thing, but when gunfights did occur, the cause for each varied. Some were simply the result of the heat of the moment, while others were longstanding feuds, or between bandits and lawmen. Although mostly romanticized, there were instances of "quick draw" that did occur though rarely, such as Wild Bill Hickok – Davis Tutt shootout and Luke Short-Jim Courtright duel. Fatal duels were fought to uphold personal honor in the West. The most notable and well-known took place in Arizona, New Mexico, Kansas, Oklahoma, and Texas. To prevent gunfights, towns such as Dodge City and Tombstone prohibited firearms in town.


title: American frontier

text: In 1848, when the U.S. won the Mexican–American War, it gained seven new territories: California, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, Colorado, Nevada, and Utah. This was the biggest cause of the Wild West era. When people relocated to the underdeveloped badlands; a pure culture was developed within Western America. Sonora's culture was also acculturated to the Wild West.


title: American frontier

text: On June 13, 1898, the Yukon Territory Act created Yukon as a separate Canadian territory. The trail to its capital, Dawson City, gave prospectors access to gold mines. causing the Klondike Gold Rush. The Klondike Trail was a dangerous place; many wild animals attacked the prospectors, and contagious diseases spread throughout the trail. In total, over 1,000 died on the trail from various causes.


title: American frontier

text: The exploration, settlement, exploitation, and conflicts of the "American Old West" form a unique tapestry of events, which has been celebrated by Americans and foreigners alike—in art, music, dance, novels, magazines, short stories, poetry, theater, video games, movies, radio, television, song, and oral tradition—which continues in the modern era. Beth E. Levy argues that the physical and mythological west inspired composers Aaron Copland, Roy Harris, Virgil Thomson, Charles Wakefield Cadman, and Arthur Farwell.


title: American frontier

text: Religious themes have inspired many environmentalists as they contemplate the pristine West before the frontiersmen violated its spirituality. Actually, as a historian William Cronon has demonstrated, the concept of "wilderness" was highly negative and the antithesis of religiosity before the romantic movement of the 19th century.


title: American frontier

text: The Frontier Thesis of historian Frederick Jackson Turner, proclaimed in 1893, established the main lines of historiography which fashioned scholarship for three or four generations and appeared in the textbooks used by practically all American students.


title: American frontier

text: The mythologizing of the West began with minstrel shows and popular music in the 1840s. During the same period, P. T. Barnum presented Native chiefs, dances, and other Wild West exhibits in his museums. However, large scale awareness took off when the dime novel appeared in 1859, the first being "Malaeska, the Indian Wife of the White Hunter". By simplifying reality and grossly exaggerating the truth, the novels captured the public's attention with sensational tales of violence and heroism and fixed in the public's mind stereotypical images of heroes and villains—courageous cowboys and savage Natives, virtuous lawmen and ruthless outlaws, brave settlers and predatory cattlemen. Millions of copies and thousands of titles were sold. The novels relied on a series of predictable literary formulas appealing to mass tastes and were often written in as little as a few days. The most successful of all dime novels was Edward S. Ellis' "Seth Jones" (1860). Ned Buntline's stories glamorized Buffalo Bill Cody, and Edward L. Wheeler created "Deadwood Dick" and "Hurricane Nell" while featuring Calamity Jane.


title: American frontier

text: Buffalo Bill Cody was the most effective popularizer of the Old West in the U.S. and Europe. He presented the first "Wild West" show in 1883, featuring a recreation of famous battles (especially Custer's Last Stand), expert marksmanship, and dramatic demonstrations of horsemanship by cowboys and natives, as well as sure-shooting Annie Oakley.


title: American frontier

text: Elite Eastern writers and artists of the late 19th century promoted and celebrated western lore. Theodore Roosevelt, wearing his hats as a historian, explorer, hunter, rancher, and naturalist, was especially productive. Their work appeared in upscale national magazines such as "Harper's Weekly" featured illustrations by artists Frederic Remington, Charles M. Russell, and others. Readers bought action-filled stories by writers like Owen Wister, conveying vivid images of the Old West. Remington lamented the passing of an era he helped to chronicle when he wrote:


title: American frontier

text: In the 20th century, both tourists to the West, and avid readers enjoyed the visual imagery of the frontier. The Western movies provided the most famous examples, as in the numerous films of John Ford. He was especially enamored of Monument Valley. Critic Keith Phipps says, "its have defined what decades of moviegoers think of when they imagine the American West." The heroic stories coming out of the building of the transcontinental railroad in the mid-1860s enlivened many dime novels and illustrated many newspapers and magazines with the juxtaposition of the traditional environment with the iron horse of modernity.


title: American frontier

text: The cowboy has for over a century been an iconic American image both in the country and abroad; recognized worldwide and revered by Americans.


title: American frontier

text: Heather Cox Richardson argues for a political dimension to the cowboy image:The timing of the cattle industry’s growth meant that cowboy imagery grew to have extraordinary power. Entangled in the vicious politics of the postwar years, Democrats, especially those in the old Confederacy, imagined the West as a land untouched by Republican politicians they hated. They developed an image of the cowboys as men who worked hard, played hard, lived by a code of honor, protected themselves, and asked nothing of the government. In the hands of Democratic newspaper editors, the realities of cowboy life -- the poverty, the danger, the debilitating hours -- became romantic. Cowboys embodied virtues Democrats believed Republicans were destroying by creating a behemoth government catering to lazy ex-slaves. By the 1860s, cattle drives were a feature of the plains landscape, and Democrats had made cowboys a symbol of rugged individual independence, something they insisted Republicans were destroying.


title: American frontier

text: The most famous popularizers of the image included part-time cowboy and "Rough Rider" President Theodore Roosevelt (1858–1919), a Republican who made "cowboy" internationally synonymous with the brash aggressive American. He was followed by trick roper Will Rogers (1879–1935), the leading humorist of the 1920s.


title: American frontier

text: Roosevelt had conceptualized the herder (cowboy) as a stage of civilization distinct from the sedentary farmer—a theme well expressed in the 1944 Hollywood hit "Oklahoma!" that highlights the enduring conflict between cowboys and farmers. Roosevelt argued that the manhood typified by the cowboy—and outdoor activity and sports generally—was essential if American men were to avoid the softness and rot produced by an easy life in the city.


title: American frontier

text: Will Rogers, the son of a Cherokee judge in Oklahoma, started with rope tricks and fancy riding, but by 1919 discovered his audiences were even more enchanted with his wit in his representation of the wisdom of the common man.


title: American frontier

text: Others who contributed to enhancing the romantic image of the American cowboy include Charles Siringo (1855–1928) and Andy Adams (1859–1935). Cowboy, Pinkerton detective, and western author, Siringo was the first authentic cowboy autobiographer. Adams spent the 1880s in the cattle industry in Texas and the 1890s mining in the Rockies. When an 1898 play's portrayal of Texans outraged Adams, he started writing plays, short stories, and novels drawn from his own experiences. His "The Log of a Cowboy" (1903) became a classic novel about the cattle business, especially the cattle drive. It described a fictional drive of the Circle Dot herd from Texas to Montana in 1882 and became a leading source on cowboy life; historians retraced its path in the 1960s, confirming its basic accuracy. His writings are acclaimed and criticized for realistic fidelity to detail on the one hand and thin literary qualities on the other. Many regard "Red River" (1948), directed by Howard Hawks, and starring John Wayne and Montgomery Clift, as an authentic cattle drive depiction.


title: American frontier

text: The unique skills of the cowboys are highlighted in the rodeo. It began in an organized fashion in the West in the 1880s, when several Western cities followed up on touring Wild West shows and organized celebrations that included rodeo activities. The establishment of major cowboy competitions in the East in the 1920s led to the growth of rodeo sports. Trail cowboys who were also known as gunfighters like John Wesley Hardin, Luke Short and others, were known for their prowess, speed and skill with their pistols and other firearms. Their violent escapades and reputations morphed over time into the stereotypical image of violence endured by the "cowboy hero".


title: American frontier

text: Historians of the American West have written about the mythic West; the west of western literature, art and of people's shared memories. The phenomenon is "the Imagined West". The "Code of the West" was an unwritten, socially agreed upon set of informal laws shaping the cowboy culture of the Old West. Over time, the cowboys developed a personal culture of their own, a blend of values that even retained vestiges of chivalry. Such hazardous work in isolated conditions also bred a tradition of self-dependence and individualism, with great value put on personal honesty, exemplified in songs and cowboy poetry. The code also included the gunfighter, who sometimes followed a form of code duello adopted from the Old South, in order to solve disputes and duels. Extrajudicial justice seen during the frontier days such as lynching, vigilantism and gunfighting, in turn popularized by the Western genre, would later be known in modern times as examples of "frontier justice."


title: American frontier

text: Scores of Turner students became professors in history departments in the western states and taught courses on the frontier. Scholars have debunked many of the myths of the frontier, but they nevertheless live on in community traditions, folklore, and fiction. In the 1970s a historiographical range war broke out between the traditional frontier studies, which stress the influence of the frontier on all of American history and culture, and the "New Western History" which narrows the geographical and time framework to concentrate on the trans-Mississippi West after 1850. It avoids the word "frontier" and stresses cultural interaction between white culture and groups such as Natives and Hispanics. History professor William Weeks of the University of San Diego argues that in this "New Western History" approach:


title: American frontier

text: However, by 2005, Aron argues, the two sides had "reached an equilibrium in their rhetorical arguments and critiques".


title: American frontier

text: Meanwhile, environmental history has emerged, in large part from the frontier historiography, hence its emphasis on wilderness. It plays an increasingly large role in frontier studies. Historians approached the environment for the frontier or regionalism. The first group emphasizes human agency on the environment; the second looks at the influence of the environment. William Cronon has argued that Turner's famous 1893 essay was environmental history in an embryonic form. It emphasized the vast power of free land to attract and reshape settlers, making a transition from wilderness to civilization.


title: American frontier

text: Journalist Samuel Lubell saw similarities between the frontier's Americanization of immigrants that Turner described and the social climbing by later immigrants in large cities as they moved to wealthier neighborhoods. He compared the effects of the railroad opening up Western lands to urban transportation systems and the automobile, and Western settlers' "land hunger" to poor city residents seeking social status. Just as the Republican party benefited from support from "old" immigrant groups that settled on frontier farms, "new" urban immigrants formed an important part of the Democratic New Deal coalition that began with Franklin Delano Roosevelt's victory in the 1932 presidential election.


title: American frontier

text: Since the 1960s an active center is the history department at the University of New Mexico, along with the University of New Mexico Press. Leading historians there include Gerald D. Nash, Donald C. Cutter, Richard N. Ellis, Richard Etulain, Margaret Connell-Szasz, Paul Hutton, Virginia Scharff, and Samuel Truett. The department has collaborated with other departments and emphasizes Southwestern regionalism, minorities in the Southwest, and historiography.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: Lamar Demeatrice Jackson Jr. (born January 7, 1997) is an American football quarterback for the Baltimore Ravens of the National Football League (NFL). He played college football at Louisville, where he won the Heisman Trophy during his sophomore year, and was selected by the Ravens as the final first round pick of the 2018 NFL Draft. Jackson became the Ravens' starting quarterback in his rookie season after an injury to incumbent Joe Flacco and clinched a division title with the team, also becoming the youngest NFL quarterback to start a playoff game at age 21.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: The next year, Jackson set the season record for quarterback rushing yards and led the league in touchdown passes while bringing the Ravens to the top seed of the American Football Conference (AFC). For his success, he became the second unanimous Most Valuable Player (MVP) and the fourth African-American quarterback to win the award. Jackson followed up his MVP campaign by becoming the first quarterback to have multiple 1,000 yards rushing seasons and led the Ravens to a third consecutive playoff appearance.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: Jackson was born to Felicia Jones and Lamar Jackson Sr. on January 7, 1997. He grew up in the center of an economically distressed section of Pompano Beach, Florida. Jackson's father died from a heart attack on the same day his grandmother died in 2005, when Jackson was 8 years old. His siblings and he were raised by their mother.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: He attended public schools and played Pop Warner football in the same Florida league with future teammate Marquise Brown. When he was 8 years old, Jackson could throw a football 20 yards. In high school, Jackson threw a football 100 yards.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: Jackson was a standout quarterback at Boynton Beach High School in Boynton Beach, Florida. At Boynton Beach, Jackson was a successful read-option quarterback who could run and throw the ball equally well. He improved passing accuracy and decision-making by watching hours of film each week. In two years at Boynton Beach, Jackson threw for 2,263 yards and 31 touchdowns with nine interceptions. Additionally, he ran for 1,624 yards and 22 touchdowns, and had a quarterback rating of 102.7. Jackson's last high school game came against a nationally ranked Miami Central High School team during the first round of the 2014 Florida High School Football Playoff 6A tournament. Boynton Beach was soundly defeated 49–6, with Jackson throwing two interceptions. He also competed for his high school track team, posting a personal record of 11.45 seconds in the 100 meter dash in one track meet. Jackson was named the Lou Groza Palm Beach County High School Player of the Year in 2014.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: Jackson was rated three stars by ESPN.com and 247Sports, but four stars by Rivals.com. Despite the disagreement by recruiting companies over his caliber, he received offers from both Power Five schools like Louisville, Florida, Auburn, and Clemson, and mid-major programs like Akron, Western Kentucky, and Marshall. All of the major recruiting companies listed Jackson as a top 20 dual-threat quarterback, with 247Sports ranking him as high as #12. Jackson's in-state ranking also varied greatly, from as high as #51 from Rivals to as low as #80 by ESPN. Jackson visited only four schools (Louisville, Florida, Nebraska, and Mississippi State), and after it appeared he might sign with Florida, Jackson ultimately committed to the University of Louisville after head coach Bobby Petrino promised Jackson's mother that her son would be playing quarterback and nothing else.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: As a freshman at Louisville in 2015 (he was a communications major), Jackson played in 12 games and made eight starts in the Cardinals' 8–5 season. He completed 135-of-247 passes for 1,840 yards with 12 touchdowns and eight interceptions and ran for 960 yards and 11 rushing touchdowns. He was named the MVP of the 2015 Music City Bowl after passing for 227 yards with two touchdowns and rushing for a Music City Bowl-record 226 yards and two touchdowns.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: During the first game of his sophomore year, against the Charlotte 49ers, Jackson set a university record for total touchdowns with eight, all of them in the first half. Against Syracuse, Jackson completed 20 of 39 passes for 411 yards, one touchdown, and one interception, with 199 rushing yards and four rushing touchdowns, with all five touchdowns coming in the first half as the Cardinals routed the Orange 62–28. One of those touchdowns came when he hurdled over a Syracuse defender into the end zone.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: Against #2 Florida State, Jackson completed 13 of 20 passes for 216 yards, threw one touchdown and one interception, and had 146 rushing yards and four rushing touchdowns. He scored four of the five total touchdowns in the first half in a 63–20 route of the Seminoles, the most points that the Seminoles had ever surrendered at the time. The game made Jackson the Heisman front runner, and gave the Cardinals a No. 3 ranking, their highest since 2006. Against Marshall, Jackson completed 24 of 44 passes for 417 yards and five touchdowns, and had 62 rushing yards and two rushing touchdowns. Against No. 5 Clemson, Louisville's offense totaled 586 yards, with Jackson accounting for 295 passing yards, 162 rushing yards, and three total touchdowns (one passing, two rushing). The Cardinals eventually lost the game 42–36. On December 8, Jackson was awarded the Walter Camp Award as the player of the year and the Maxwell Award as the best all-around player in college football.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: On December 10, 2016, Jackson was selected as the 2016 Heisman Trophy winner over fellow finalists Deshaun Watson, Dede Westbrook, Jabrill Peppers, and Baker Mayfield. He became Louisville's first Heisman Trophy winner in school history, and the youngest-ever recipient of the award at the age of 19 years and 337 days. Jackson finished Louisville's 9–4 season with 3,543 passing yards, 30 passing touchdowns, and nine interceptions to go along with 260 carries for 1,571 rushing yards and 21 rushing touchdowns.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: Aside from nationally recognized awards, Jackson also won prestigious awards within the University of Louisville. In 2017, Jackson won a Louie for being named the Adidas High Performance Male Athlete of the Year for his outstanding sophomore campaign. He also won a Louie for Play of the Year after the leap he made in the 2016 Syracuse game.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: When Jackson entered the 2017 season, his fan base and media had high expectations of his performance. "College GameDay" announced their return to the University of Louisville to host the opening matchup on September 16 between the returning National Champions, Clemson Tigers, and the Cardinals. Despite the 47–21 blowout the Tigers achieved, Jackson did not let the numbers affect his playing ability. His remarkable statistics for the season resulted in his being a Heisman finalist for the 2017 season. He finished in third place in the Heisman voting, losing out to Baker Mayfield and Bryce Love. Jackson played in 13 games, finishing with 3,660 passing yards, 27 passing touchdowns, and 10 interceptions to go along with 232 carries for 1,601 rushing yards and 18 rushing touchdowns in the Cardinals' 8–5 season.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: Following the 2017–18 school year, Jackson was named the men's ACC Athlete of the Year for all conference sports, sharing honors with women's winner Arike Ogunbowale of Notre Dame basketball.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: On January 5, 2018, Jackson announced that he would enter the 2018 NFL Draft. Some draft pundits doubted Jackson's quarterback abilities and suggested that he switch positions to wide receiver due to his athleticism, but he remained adamant about his intention to play quarterback professionally. He declined to run drills such as the 40-yard dash during the NFL Scouting Combine, in order to focus on displaying his passing skills. Jackson reportedly clocked in a 4.34 40 yard dash time in 2017 at Louisville which would have been the fastest time in NFL history for a quarterback.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: Jackson was drafted by the Baltimore Ravens in the first round with the 32nd overall pick in the draft, after trading up for the selection with the Philadelphia Eagles. He was the fifth quarterback selected that year. On June 5, 2018, Jackson signed his rookie contract, reportedly worth $9.47 million with a $4.97 million signing bonus.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: Jackson made his NFL debut relieving starting quarterback Joe Flacco in the second half of a 47–3 victory against the Buffalo Bills, finishing with 24 passing yards and 39 rushing yards, in the season opener. During Week 7, Jackson scored his first NFL touchdown on a 1-yard run as the Ravens narrowly lost to the New Orleans Saints by a score of 23–24. Jackson threw his first NFL touchdown pass, a 26-yard completion to fellow rookie tight end Hayden Hurst, the next week in relief of Flacco in the fourth quarter of a 36–21 loss to the Carolina Panthers.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: On November 18, 2018, Jackson made his first NFL start against the Cincinnati Bengals in place of the injured Joe Flacco, who injured his hip two weeks prior against the Pittsburgh Steelers. Jackson went 13 for 19 for 150 yards and an interception and rushed for 117 yards, which was a Ravens franchise record for rushing yards by a quarterback in a single game in a 24–21 victory. The following week against the Oakland Raiders, Jackson threw for 178 yards, one touchdown, and two interceptions. He also rushed for 71 yards and a rushing touchdown. The Ravens won by a score of 34–17. During Week 13 against the Atlanta Falcons, Jackson passed for 125 yards and rushed for 75 yards and a touchdown in a 26–16 victory. In a Week 14 24–27 overtime loss to the Kansas City Chiefs, Jackson threw two touchdowns for the first time in his career.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: Jackson helped the Ravens defeat the Los Angeles Chargers in Week 16, completing 12 of 22 passes for 204 yards and a touchdown in a 22–10 upset victory. The following week against fellow rookie quarterback Baker Mayfield and the Cleveland Browns, Jackson passed for 179 yards and rushed for two touchdowns on 95 rushing yards, despite fumbling a third potential touchdown at the goal line, as the Ravens beat the Browns 26–24 to clinch the AFC North title. In the seven regular season games in which Jackson had started, the Ravens went 6–1 to close out the 2018 season. Overall, he finished the season with 1,201 passing yards, six passing touchdowns, and three interceptions. In addition, he led all quarterbacks with 695 rushing yards and added five rushing touchdowns.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: Taking the field the day before his 22nd birthday, Jackson became the youngest quarterback start an NFL playoff game in a rematch against the Chargers. Despite being held to just 25 passing yards at one point in the fourth quarter by a stout Chargers defense, Jackson then passed for two touchdowns in four minutes to bring the Ravens back from a 20-point deficit to within a touchdown. After forcing the Chargers to punt with less than a minute left, the Ravens had one last chance to win the game down six points, but Jackson was strip-sacked by Chargers linebacker Uchenna Nwosu. With the Chargers recovering the ball, the Ravens lost 23–17 and were knocked out of the playoffs. He finished the game completing 14 of 29 passes for 194 yards, the two aforementioned touchdowns, and an interception while rushing for 54 yards, losing one fumble.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: Once the 2018 season was over, the Ravens's coaching staff decided to abandon the offensive strategy that had been designed for Joe Flacco and create a new offensive philosophy centered around the specific skills of Jackson. That philosophy included changing every play in the playbook, the terminology used and drafting players or acquiring free agents that would complement Jackson's skills.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: In the season-opener against the Miami Dolphins, Jackson went 17 of 20 for career-highs of 324 yards and five touchdowns, making him the youngest quarterback to achieve a perfect passer rating in the 59–10 road victory. He was named the AFC Offensive Player of the Week for his performance. During Week 2 against the Arizona Cardinals, Jackson rushed for 120 yards and threw for 272 yards and two touchdowns, as the Ravens won by a score of 23–17. His two touchdown passes set the Ravens' franchise record for the most touchdown passes in the team's first two games of a season. Jackson became the first player in NFL history to pass for more than 250 yards and rush for 120 yards in one game.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: During Week 6 against the Cincinnati Bengals, Jackson finished with 236 passing yards, 152 rushing yards, and a rushing touchdown as the Ravens won 23–17. He also became the first player in NFL history to pass for more than 200 yards and rush for 150 yards in a regular-season game, and had more rushing yards than any player at any position in Week 6. During Week 7 against the Seattle Seahawks, Jackson finished with 143 passing yards and 116 rushing yards with a rushing touchdown as the Ravens won 30–16. After a Week 8 bye, the Ravens faced the unbeaten New England Patriots. In that game, Jackson threw for 163 yards and a touchdown and rushed for 61 yards and two touchdowns in the 37–20 victory. For his performance, Jackson earned his second AFC Offensive Player of the Week award.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: In the next game, the Ravens routed the Bengals 49–13 with Jackson throwing for 223 yards and three touchdowns and rushing for 65 yards and a touchdown, finishing with a perfect passer rating. He became only the second player in NFL history to produce two perfect passer ratings in the same season. Jackson joined Aaron Rodgers (2019) and Joe Montana (1989) as the only players in the Super Bowl era with 15-plus completions, 3-plus passing touchdowns, 1-plus rushing touchdowns, and a perfect passer rating in a single game. Jackson also earned his third total, and second consecutive, AFC Offensive Player of the Week award, matching his predecessor Joe Flacco's career total.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: During Week 11 against the Houston Texans, Jackson became the first quarterback in franchise history to throw four or more touchdowns in a game multiple times during the regular season after he threw for 222 yards and four touchdowns in a 41–7 victory. Jackson also rushed for 86 yards during the victory over the Texans, making him the only quarterback in NFL history to rush for more than 60 yards in seven consecutive games. In the next game against the Los Angeles Rams, Jackson threw for 169 yards and five touchdowns in the 45–6 road victory, making him the first player with that many touchdowns in a "Monday Night Football" debut and the youngest player with multiple five touchdown passing games in NFL history. He earned his fourth AFC Offensive Player of the Week award due to his performance. He was named the AFC's Player of the Month for November. In the next game against the San Francisco 49ers, Jackson finished with 105 passing yards, 101 rushing yards, and two total touchdowns as the Ravens won 20–17, and Jackson became the first quarterback in NFL history with four 100-yard rushing games in a season. In Week 14, in the 24–17 victory over the Buffalo Bills, Jackson became the first quarterback since Michael Vick to rush for 1,000 yards in a single season.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: Against the New York Jets in Week 15, Jackson had 212 passing yards for five touchdowns, and eight rushes for 86 yards during the 42–21 win, breaking Vick's single-season rushing record for a quarterback. His five passing touchdowns in the game made him the sixth player since the merger to have three games with at least five passing touchdowns in a season, and tied the Ravens franchise season record with 33. After his performance against the Jets, Jackson was named AFC Player of the Week for week 15. In Week 16 against the Cleveland Browns, Jackson was held to 38 passing yards and a lost fumble in the first 28 minutes, before exploding for 142 yards and two touchdowns in the last two minutes before halftime. He added a third touchdown pass in the second half of the 31–15 win, setting the Ravens single season record for touchdown passes at 36, finishing with 238 passing yards and 103 rushing yards. On the day after the Ravens' victory over the Browns, and due to the Ravens' having clinched home-field advantage, head coach John Harbaugh announced that Jackson, guard Marshal Yanda, safety Earl Thomas and defensive tackle Brandon Williams would be inactive for the Week 17 game against the Pittsburgh Steelers. Even without playing in the Ravens' final game, Jackson led all quarterbacks with 36 touchdown passes and a QBR of 81.10; he also led all rushers with a 6.9 yards per carry average. During the 2019 season he was also first with 43 total touchdowns and a 9.0 passing touchdown percentage.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: Jackson was the starting quarterback at the 2020 Pro Bowl in Orlando, Florida. He threw for 185 yards and two touchdowns with one interception and was named the offensive Most Valuable Player. He became the youngest quarterback in NFL history to start a Pro Bowl game.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: Jackson was voted the MVP of the 2019 season. He became the second player after Tom Brady in 2010 to be voted unanimously and the second-youngest player to win, behind only Jim Brown. Jackson, along with Patrick Mahomes, Cam Newton and Steve McNair, is one of the four African-American quarterbacks to win the AP MVP award.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: In the versus the Tennessee Titans, Jackson and the Ravens were not able to recreate the same success that they had in the regular season, losing 28–12. Jackson finished the game completing 31 of 59 passes for 365 yards, one touchdown and two interceptions while also losing a fumble on a strip sack. He also rushed 20 times for 143 yards becoming the first player to throw for 300+ yards and rush for 100+ yards in a playoff game. In total, Jackson personally accounted for over 500 yards of offense.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: In the season-opener against the Cleveland Browns, Jackson went 20 for 25 for 275 yards and three touchdowns in the Ravens 38–6 victory. He was named the AFC Offensive Player of the Week due to his performance. In Week 3 against the Kansas City Chiefs, Jackson threw for a career-low 97 yards and a touchdown during the 20–34 loss. In the Ravens Week 4 31–17 victory over the Washington Football Team, Jackson threw for 193 yards and two touchdowns, and rushed for 52 yards and one touchdown, making him the fastest player in NFL history to reach 5,000 yards passing and 2,000 yards rushing. In Week 8 against the Pittsburgh Steelers, Jackson threw for 208 yards and two touchdowns, but also threw two interceptions, including his first career pick six, and lost two fumbles during the 24–28 loss. On November 26, 2020, Jackson tested positive for COVID-19 and was placed on the reserve/COVID-19 list. He was activated on December 7.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: Jackson made his return in Week 13 against the Dallas Cowboys. During the game, Jackson threw for 107 yards, two touchdowns, and an interception and rushed for 94 yards and a touchdown in the 34–17 win. The next week, Jackson set an NFL record for the most rushing yards by a quarterback on "Monday Night Football" as he rushed for 124 yards in a thriller against the Cleveland Browns. However, Jackson then left the game late in the third quarter due to leg cramps. He was out of the game for most of the fourth quarter, and Cleveland was able to come back from 14-down and take a 35–34 lead. After backup Trace McSorley suffered a left knee sprain with two minutes left in regulation, Jackson re-entered the game and, on 4th down and 5, threw a 44-yard touchdown pass to Marquise Brown. After the Browns drove down and tied the game at 42, Jackson followed up with a short drive to get the Ravens into field goal range, allowing them to get the win by the score of 47–42. Jackson had two rushing touchdowns and a passing touchdown in the game and was named the AFC Offensive Player of the Week for his performance in Week 14. In Week 15 against the Jacksonville Jaguars, Jackson threw for 243 yards, three touchdowns, and one interception and rushed for 35 yards and a touchdown during the 40–14 win. In Week 17 against the Cincinnati Bengals, Jackson threw for 113 yards, three touchdowns, and one interception and rushed for 97 yards during the 38–3 win. During the game, Jackson became the first NFL quarterback to have multiple seasons surpassing 1,000 rushing yards.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: In the , Jackson won his first career playoff game by defeating the Tennessee Titans in a rematch of the previous year's Divisional Round matchup. He threw for 179 yards and one interception and rushed for 136 yards and a touchdown during the 20–13 win. In the against the Buffalo Bills, Jackson threw for 162 yards and rushed for 34 yards, but threw a costly red zone pick-six to Taron Johnson late in third quarter. He then sustained a concussion on the last play of the third quarter, effectively ending his season as the Ravens would lose 17–3.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: On April 30, 2021, the Ravens exercised the fifth-year option on Jackson's contract, worth a guaranteed $23 million for the 2022 season. Jackson was diagnosed with COVID-19 around the start of training camp, the second time he had contracted the virus.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: In Week 1, against the Las Vegas Raiders, Jackson finished with 235 passing yards, 86 rushing yards, a passing touchdown, but also lost two of three fumbles as the Ravens lost in overtime 27–33. Against the Kansas City Chiefs in Week 2, Jackson finished with 239 passing yards, 107 rushing yards, two interceptions, and three total touchdowns as the Ravens won 36–35, marking Jackson's first win over Patrick Mahomes. In Week 3, against the Detroit Lions, Jackson finished with 287 passing yards, 58 rushing yards, a passing touchdown in a close 19–17 win, as Ravens kicker Justin Tucker made an NFL record 66-yard field goal in the last seconds to win the game. In Week 5 against the Indianapolis Colts, Jackson threw for a career-high and Ravens franchise record 442 yards and four touchdowns while also rushing for 62 yards, helping the Ravens erase a 19-point deficit and win in overtime 31–25. Jackson also became the first quarterback to have a 85%+ completion rate while throwing 40+ passes. Ravens coach John Harbaugh called it one of the greatest performances he had ever seen. The next week, Jackson set the record for the most victories as a starting quarterback under the age of 25 at 35 in 34–6 rout of the Los Angeles Chargers. In Week 12 against the Cleveland Browns, Jackson threw a career high four interceptions. However, the Ravens outmatched the Browns winning 16–10. Against the Browns in Week 14, Jackson suffered an ankle injury after being hit by Jeremiah Owusu-Koramoah in the first quarter and was ruled out during the 22–24 loss. He missed the remainder of the game and, ultimately, the rest of the season. Jackson was named to his second Pro Bowl after his first coming of his unanimous MVP season.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: Jackson turned down a contract extension due to his belief that he could improve and earn more. In Week 1, he faced former Ravens quarterback Joe Flacco and the New York Jets. He threw for 213 yards, three touchdowns, and one interception while adding 17 rushing yards in a 24–9 win. The next week against the Miami Dolphins, Jackson threw for 318 yards, three touchdowns, and rushed for 119 yards and a touchdown in the 38–42 loss. In the game, Jackson surpassed Michael Vick for the most 100-yard rushing games by a quarterback with his 79-yard touchdown run in the third quarter. In Week 3 against the New England Patriots, Jackson threw for 218 yards, four touchdowns, an interception, rushed for 107 yards, and a rushing touchdown in the 37–26 win. For the first month of the 2022 NFL season, Jackson led the league in quarterback rating (119.0) and passing touchdowns (10). In addition, Jackson ran for two touchdowns. His 12 combined touchdowns were more than the number of touchdowns scored by 30 NFL teams to that point in the season. As a result, Jackson was named the AFC Offensive Player of the Month.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: In Week 6 against the New York Giants, Jackson threw for 210 yards, threw a touchdown, and rushed for 77 yards, but threw a costly interception to Julian Love and was strip-sacked by Kayvon Thibodeaux in the fourth quarter in the 24-20 loss. It was also Jackson's first loss to an NFC opponent, having been 12-0 previously.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: In Week 13 against the Denver Broncos, Jackson suffered a sprain PCL when he was sacked by Jonathon Cooper.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: Jackson has been widely regarded as the best running quarterback in the NFL since his rookie season. His dual-threat style of play has often earned him comparisons to Michael Vick. Except for his rookie season, the Ravens have led the league in rushing each year with Jackson under center. In 2019, the Ravens broke the single-season rushing record, with Jackson breaking Vick's record for most rushing yards by a quarterback in a single season.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: Concerns, however, have been raised on his ability to play as a pure pocket passer when the run game is contained. Jackson's passing concerns began during his college tenure with Louisville. Over the years, most analysts have cited improvement in his passing ability, but he is rarely mentioned with the elite passers in the league.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: Prior to the start of the 2019 NFL season, Jackson appeared on ABC's "Celebrity Family Feud", pitting current NFL players against former NFL players. During the 2019 NFL season, Jackson's "Madden NFL" character speed was upgraded to 96, making Jackson the fastest quarterback in that game's history. Jackson was the cover athlete in the "Madden NFL 21" video game.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: In February 2020, BET Digital highlighted Jackson as one of 40 of the most inspiring and innovative vanguards in African American culture and who are redefining what it means to be "unapologetically young, gifted & Black".


title: Lamar Jackson

text: As of 2019, Jackson lives in Owings Mills, Maryland, about 20 minutes from the Ravens training complex with his mother, brother, and sisters. Adoree' Jackson is his first cousin once removed. As a child, Jackson's favorite player was Michael Vick. Vick inspired Jackson to mould his dual-threat style of play to his advantage as a quarterback in the NFL.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: In 2018, Jackson announced the launch of his sportswear line, Era 8 Apparel. In March 2020, Jackson filed a federal lawsuit against Amazon, charging the corporate giant with engaging in the “deliberate and unauthorized use” of Jackson's name, image and persona. The suit also alleges that Amazon had unlawfully infringed on his right of publicity in connection with alleged “false advertising and endorsement of unlicensed and infringing articles of clothing.”


title: Lamar Jackson

text: In August 2020, Jackson signed an endorsement deal with Oakley, Inc., a company that produces sunglasses, sports goggles and football helmet visors.


title: Lamar Jackson

text: In May 2022, it was announced that Jackson had entered the restaurant business with the purchase of a soul food restaurant in his home state of Florida. Tasty's Soul Food Sports Bar & Grill in Pompano Beach will change its name to Play Action Soulfood and More; and asking the question "You 8 yet?"


title: Lamar Jackson

text: In September 2022, Jackson posted on his Twitter that he will be the cover star of NFL's first virtual reality (VR) game. "NFL Pro Era" is the first VR NFL game is said to let users 'experience what it's like to compete as the QB of their favorite NFL team.' The game is slated to launch September 15, 2022, on PlayStation VR and Meta Quest.


title: Rat Pack

text: The Rat Pack was an informal group of entertainers, the second iteration of which ultimately made films and appeared together in Las Vegas casino venues. They originated in the late 1940s and early 1950s as a group of A-list show business friends, such as Errol Flynn, Nat King Cole, Mickey Rooney, Frank Sinatra and others who met casually at the Holmby Hills home of Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall. In the 1960s, the group featured Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis Jr., Joey Bishop, and (before falling out with Sinatra in 1962) Peter Lawford, among others. They appeared together on stage and in films in the 1950s and 1960s, including the films "Ocean's 11", and "Sergeants 3"; after Lawford's expulsion, they filmed "Robin and the 7 Hoods" with Bing Crosby in what was to have been Lawford's role. Sinatra, Martin, and Davis were regarded as the group's lead members after Bogart's death.


title: Rat Pack

text: The name "Rat Pack" was first used to refer to a group of friends in New York, and several explanations have been offered for the name. According to one version, Lauren Bacall saw her husband Humphrey Bogart and his friends returning from a night in Las Vegas and said, "You look like a goddamn rat pack." "Rat Pack" may also be a shortened version of "Holmby Hills Rat Pack", a reference to the home of Bogart and Bacall which served as a regular hangout of the same group of friends during the late 1940s and early 1950s.


title: Rat Pack

text: Visiting members included Errol Flynn, Ava Gardner, Nat King Cole, Robert Mitchum, Elizabeth Taylor, Janet Leigh, Tony Curtis, Mickey Rooney, Lena Horne, Jerry Lewis, and Cesar Romero. According to Stephen Bogart, the original members of the Holmby Hills Rat Pack were Frank Sinatra (pack master), Judy Garland (first vice-president), Sid Luft (cage master), Bogart (rat in charge of public relations), Swifty Lazar (recording secretary and treasurer), Nathaniel Benchley (historian), David Niven, Katharine Hepburn, Spencer Tracy, George Cukor, Cary Grant, Rex Harrison, and Jimmy Van Heusen. The Rat Pack group underwent several transformations. The publicly best-known transformation happened under the leadership of Frank Sinatra.


title: Rat Pack

text: In 1957, after the passing of Bogart, Frank Sinatra and Lauren Bacall became engaged and planned a marriage while living together in Sinatra's homes. Frank Sinatra became the Rat Pack leader from 1957 on. By the end of the 1950s, the Rat Pack evolved into an informal production group whose members united their star power to support each other's careers. At that time, the Rat Pack activities expanded to Las Vegas where members performed regular gigs and helped each other by making unannounced appearances to impress the audiences. In 1958, three Rat Pack members, Sinatra, Martin, and MacLaine starred in "Some Came Running" that was popular with the public. At the same time in 1958, a story about a series of Las Vegas casino robberies circulated among entertainers, so Peter Lawford bought the rights and Frank Sinatra became interested in the idea. Several members of the Rat Pack who were regulars in Vegas, were naturally fit to lead the cast of characters in the upcoming production, including Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis Jr., Peter Lawford, and Joey Bishop. and also Angie Dickinson, Cesar Romero, and Shirley MacLaine. A variety of writers worked on the project, titled Ocean's 11, and the production was set to begin in January 1960.


title: Rat Pack

text: The film "Ocean's 11", made between January and March of 1960, shows several members of the Rat Pack group as they were in the late 1950s and early 1960s. This was the second incarnation of the Rat Pack under the leadership of Frank Sinatra.


title: Rat Pack

text: The early 1960s version of the group included Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis Jr., Peter Lawford, and Joey Bishop. This group was originally known as the "Clan", but that name fell out of favor because it was reminiscent of the Ku Klux Klan.


title: Rat Pack

text: Marilyn Monroe, Angie Dickinson, Juliet Prowse, Buddy Greco, and Shirley MacLaine were often referred to as the "Rat Pack Mascots".


title: Rat Pack

text: Comedian Don Rickles wrote that "I never received an official membership card but Frank made me feel part of the fun."


title: Rat Pack

text: Peter Lawford was a brother-in-law of President John F. Kennedy (dubbed "Brother-in-Lawford" by Sinatra), and Kennedy spent time with Sinatra and the others when he visited Las Vegas, during which members sometimes referred to the group as "the Jack Pack". Rat Pack members played a role in campaigning for Kennedy and the Democrats, appearing at the July 1960 Democratic National Convention in Los Angeles. Lawford asked Sinatra if he would have Kennedy as a guest at his Palm Springs house in March 1962 and Sinatra went to great lengths to accommodate the President, including the construction of a helipad. Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy advised his brother to sever ties to Sinatra because of his association with Mafia figures such as Sam Giancana and he cancelled the visit. Kennedy instead stayed at Bing Crosby's estate, which further infuriated Sinatra. Lawford was blamed for this and Sinatra "never again had a good word" for him. Lawford's role was written out of the upcoming "4 for Texas", and his part in "Robin and the 7 Hoods" was given to Bing Crosby.


title: Rat Pack

text: Sinatra, Davis, and Martin announced a 29-date tour called "Together Again" in December 1987. At the press conference to announce the tour, Martin joked about calling it off, and Sinatra rebuked a reporter for using the term "Rat Pack", referring to it as "that stupid phrase".


title: Rat Pack

text: Dean Martin's son Dean Paul Martin died in a plane crash in March 1987 on the San Gorgonio Mountain in California, the same mountain where Sinatra's mother was killed in a plane crash ten years earlier. Martin had since become increasingly dependent on alcohol and prescription drugs. Davis had hip replacement surgery two years previously, and was estranged from Sinatra because of Davis's use of cocaine. Davis was also experiencing severe financial difficulties, and was promised by Sinatra's people that he could earn between six and eight million dollars from the tour.


title: Rat Pack

text: Martin had not made a film or recorded since 1984 and Sinatra felt that the tour would be good for Martin, telling Davis, "I think it would be great for Dean. Get him out. For that alone it would be worth doing". Sinatra and Davis still performed regularly, yet they had not recorded for several years. Both Sinatra and Martin had made their last film appearances together in 1984's "Cannonball Run II", which also starred Davis. This marked the trio's first feature film appearance since 1964's "Robin and the 7 Hoods". Martin expressed reservations about the tour, wondering whether they could draw as many people as they had in the past. Sinatra and Davis complained during private rehearsals about the lack of black musicians in the orchestra. The tour began at the Oakland-Alameda County Coliseum Arena on March 13, 1988 to a sold-out crowd of 14,500.


title: Rat Pack

text: Davis opened the show, followed by Martin and then Sinatra; after an interval, the three performed a medley of songs. During the show, Martin threw a lit cigarette at the audience. He withdrew from the tour after just five shows, citing a flare-up of a kidney problem. Sinatra and Davis continued the tour under the title "The Ultimate Event" with Liza Minnelli replacing Martin as the third member of the trio.


title: Rat Pack

text: Davis's associate stated that Sinatra's people were skimming the top of the revenues from the concerts, as well as stuffing envelopes full of cash into suitcases after the performances. In August 1989, Davis was diagnosed with throat cancer which caused his death in May 1990. He was buried with a gold watch that Sinatra had given him at the conclusion of "The Ultimate Event Tour".


title: Rat Pack

text: A 1988 performance of "The Ultimate Event" in Detroit was recorded and shown on Showtime the following year as a tribute to the recently deceased Davis. A review in "The New York Times" praised Davis's performance, describing it as "pure, ebullient, unapologetic show business."


title: Rat Pack

text: Concerning the group's reputation for womanizing and heavy drinking, Joey Bishop stated in a 1998 interview: "I never saw Frank, Dean Martin, Sammy or Peter drunk during performances. That was only a gag! And do you believe these guys had to chase broads? They had to chase 'em away!"


title: Rat Pack

text: Archival footage of Lawford and Sinatra was used in the 1974 compilation film "That's Entertainment!".


title: Rat Pack

text: Shirley MacLaine appeared in the 1958 film "Some Came Running", along with Sinatra and Martin. She had a major role (and Sinatra a cameo) in the 1956 Oscar-winning film "Around the World in 80 Days". MacLaine played a Hindu princess who is rescued by, and falls in love with, original Rat Pack associate David Niven, and Sinatra had a non-speaking, non-singing role as a piano player in a saloon, whose identity is concealed from the viewer until he turns his face toward the camera during a scene featuring Marlene Dietrich and George Raft. MacLaine appeared alongside Sinatra in "Can-Can". She also had an appearance in the 1960 film "Ocean's 11" as a drunken woman. The 1984 film "Cannonball Run II", with MacLaine, marked the final time members of the Rat Pack shared theatrical screen-time together.


title: Rat Pack

text: A biopic titled "The Rat Pack", made by HBO in 1998, starred Ray Liotta as Sinatra, Joe Mantegna as Martin, and Don Cheadle as Davis, dramatizing their private lives and, in particular, their roles in the 1960 presidential campaign of John F. Kennedy.


title: Rat Pack

text: "Christmas with the Rat Pack", a collection of holiday tunes sung by Sinatra, Martin and Davis, was released in 2001. "" went on sale in 2003. A concert featuring the three men, "Live from the Sands" in Las Vegas, is also


title: Rat Pack

text: "" tribute show originated on stage in London in 2000 and has been running continuously since then throughout Europe and North America.


title: Chicago Bears

text: The Chicago Bears are a professional American football team based in Chicago. The Bears compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the league's National Football Conference (NFC) North division. The Bears have won nine NFL Championships, including one Super Bowl, and hold the NFL record for the most enshrinees in the Pro Football Hall of Fame and the most retired jersey numbers. The Bears have also recorded the second-most victories of any NFL franchise, only behind the Green Bay Packers.


title: Chicago Bears

text: The franchise was founded in Decatur, Illinois, on September 20, 1919 and became professional on September 17, 1920, and moved to Chicago in 1921. It is one of only two remaining franchises from the NFL's founding in 1920, along with the Arizona Cardinals, which was originally also in Chicago. The team played home games at Wrigley Field on Chicago's North Side through the 1970 season; they now play at Soldier Field on the Near South Side, adjacent to Lake Michigan. The Bears have a long-standing rivalry with the Green Bay Packers.


title: Chicago Bears

text: The team headquarters, Halas Hall, is in the Chicago suburb of Lake Forest, Illinois. The Bears practice at adjoining facilities there during the season, and began hosting Training Camp at Halas Hall in 2020 after major renovations.


title: Chicago Bears

text: Originally named the Decatur Staleys, the club was established by the A. E. Staley food starch company of Decatur, Illinois as a company team. This was the typical start for several early professional football franchises. The team played independently in 1919, winning the Central Illinois Championship. The company hired George Halas and Edward "Dutch" Sternaman in 1920 to run the team. The 1920 Decatur Staleys season was their inaugural regular season completed in the newly formed American Professional Football Association (later renamed the National Football League (NFL) in 1922).