American history through independence (Section 1 RED QUESTIONS ONLY))

Question 1

Approximately how many different Native American nations existed before the arrival of Columbus, and in what basic characteristics did they each differ from one another?

Answer 1

At least 100, each with a different language, social system, and stage of economic development.

Question 2

What year did Cristobal Colón (a.k.a. Christopher Columbus) first arrive in the Western Hemisphere?

Answer 2

1492

Question 3

What two European nations were the first to colonize the Americas, and which of these two was the first to colonize in North America?

Answer 3

Spain, then Portugal.

Question 4

What Native American civilization, located in present day Mexico, had probably the largest city in the world when European explorers encountered it in 1519? ..and what was the name of the city?

Answer 4

Aztec.

Tenochtitlan. [you will not be asked to spell this; you just need to be able to recognize it!]

Question 5

What was the ultimate fate of 90% of the indigenous population of Central and South America during the 16th Century?

Answer 5

Between 1492 and 1600, the indigenous population of Central and South America declined by 90%, in large part due to lack of resistance to European diseases (particularly smallpox). Those who didn’t die from disease had a good chance of being worked to death doing slave labor.

Question 6

What Native American city in NORTH America (that had been located in modern-day Illinois just across the Mississippi River from modern-day St. Louis, Missouri) was, at least for a brief period, larger in population than the largest European city (London) in about the mid-1200s (Note: this city died out before any Europeans colonized North America)

Answer 6

Cahokia

Question 7

What was the name of the Native American confederation of tribes that occupied the land today called “Southern Westchester” along the “Hudson” river?

Answer 7

Wappinger

Question 8

The Wecquaesgeek tribe occupied the land on which DFHS now sits. One of their main trails was called Wickquasgeck. A modern road today follows the outline of this trail. What is it called?

Answer 8

Broadway (or Route 9)

Question 9

In what order were the Plymouth, Massachusetts Bay, New Amsterdam, and Jamestown colonies first settled? In the first third of which century?
(Use the date of settlement, NOT the date the colony was formally founded).

Answer 9

Jamestown (1607)
Nieuw Amsterdam (1609–colony
officialy chartered in 1624 but settled
earlier)
Plymouth (1620)
Massachusetts Bay (1630)
[You don’t need to remember the dates, just the order]

Question 10

Which of the above colonies (in question 10a) had been already settled when the first enslaved Africans were brought to the Atlantic coast of North America? (& what year did this happen?)

Answer 10

Jamestown and
Nieuw Amsterdam.

First enslaved Americans brought forcibly in 1619.

Question 11

Which of the above four colonies (in Question 10a) was not English, and which nation founded it?

Answer 11

Nieuw Amsterdam. The Netherlands.

Question 12

What European nation first settled the area that now comprises New York City, and what was this settlement called?

Answer 12

The Netherlands. Nieuw Amsterdam.

Question 13

Which of the above colonies’ (see Question 10a) founding is associated with the U.S. holiday of Thanksgiving?

Answer 13

Plymouth

Question 14

What kind of “religious freedom” were the “Pilgrims” who settled Plymouth Colony seeking?

Answer 14

Freedom to practice their brand of Christianity their way (i.e., NOT freedom for everyone to practice religion whatever way he/she preferred).

Question 15

What agricultural product was instrumental in the survival and eventual prosperity of the Jamestown (Virginia) Colony?

Answer 15

Tobacco

Question 16

What was the Mayflower Compact and why is it considered significant in the development of democratic government?

Answer 16

A document signed by the 40 “Pilgrims” on the Mayflower agreeing that they together, collectively, would form their own government when they arrived in the New World. This is regarded as an early instance of the philosophy that “government comes from the consent of the governed.” [It is important to note that there were 80 others on the ship who were not consulted in making the agreement!]

Question 17

Which individual is associated with the quotations “No taxation without representation!” and “Give me liberty or give me death!”?

Answer 17

Patrick Henry

Question 18

What was the Stamp Act?

Answer 18

An unpopular tax on paper goods in Britain’s American colonies. Colonial reaction to this tax is often regarded, at least in popular imagination, as the first stirring of the American revolution.

Question 19

What happened at the “Boston Tea Party?”

Answer 19

Members of the “Sons of Liberty”, an American anti-government militia boarded a ship laden with 15,000 pounds worth of tea and dumped its contents in Boston Harbor, prompting a harsh crackdown on the American colonies by the British government.

Question 20

Why would it have made no sense for Paul Revere to have shouted “the British are coming!”?

Answer 20

Paul Revere was British (regarded himself as a subject of the King), as were all American colonists at the time.

Question 21

Why are Lexington and Concord significant towns in U.S. history?

Answer 21

It was in these towns that the first exchanges of gunfire between local American militia-men and British troops occurred; considered the first battles of the “Revolutionary War.”

Question 22

In which document would you find the phrase “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal…”?

Answer 22

The Declaration of Independence