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A territory of the north-central United States organized in 1861 and divided into the states of North Dakota and South Dakota in 1889. The territory included much of present-day Montana until 1864 and Wyoming until 1868.
The Dakota Territory corresponded to the present states of North Dakota, South Dakota, and much of Wyoming and Montana. The first trading post in this region was built by Jean Baptiste Truteau in Charles Mix County, South Dakota, in 1794. The most famous trading post on the Missouri River was Fort Union, built at the mouth of the Yellowstone River in 1829. The Dakotas were mostly populated by the Sioux, or Dakota Indians, who resisted violently to protect their rights to the region after the discovery of gold in the Black Hills region of South Dakota led to an influx of white settlers and aggressive claims to the region by the United States government.
The United States reorganized its territorial claims to this region often. It all fell within the vast Missouri Territory created in 1812, part of which was added to Michigan Territory in 1834. In 1836, 1838, and 1849, Dakota became part of Wisconsin, Iowa, and Minnesota Territories, respectively. From 1834, the western part of the later Dakota Territory was designated Indian Country, and, in 1854, became part of Nebraska Territory. Dakota Territory, created by Congress in 1861, included lands west of present-day Minnesota and almost all of Nebraska Territory north of the forty-third parallel to the Missouri River. Montana Territory was cut off from Dakota Territory in 1864. When Wyoming Territory was created in 1868, Dakota Territory was reduced to the region comprising the two Dakotas of today, with a capital at Bismarck. In 1889, the territory was divided into the existing states of North Dakota and South Dakota.
Bibliography
Barbour, Barton H. Fort Union and the Upper Missouri Fur Trade. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2001.
Lamar, Howard. Dakota Territory, 1861–1889: A Study of Frontier Politics. New Haven, Conn: Yale University Press, 1956.
—O. G. Libby/H. S.
Dakota Territory was the name of an organized territory of the United States that existed from 1861 to 1889. The territory consisted of the northernmost part of the land acquired in the Louisiana Purchase of the United States.
Most of Dakota Territory was formerly part of the Minnesota and Nebraska territories. When Minnesota became a state in 1858, the leftover area east of the Missouri River fell unorganized. When the Yankton Treaty was signed later that year, ceding much of what had been Lakota land to the U.S. Government, early settlers formed an unofficial provisional government and unsuccessfully lobbied for United States territory status. However, it wasn't until three years later when soon-to-be-President Abraham Lincoln's cousin-in-law, J.B.S. Todd, personally lobbied for territory status that Washington formally created Dakota Territory.
It became a historic, organized territory on March 2, 1861. Upon creation, the territory of Dakota Territory included much of present-day Montana and Wyoming; by 1868, creation of new territories reduced Dakota Territory to the present boundaries of the Dakotas.
The territorial capital was Yankton from 1861 until 1883, when it was moved to Bismarck. Dakota Territory was divided into the states of North Dakota and South Dakota on November 2, 1889. The admission of two states, as opposed to one, was done for a number of reasons. The two centers of population in the territory were in the northeast and southeast corners of the territory, several hundred miles away from each other. On a national level, there was pressure from the Republican Party to admit the two states rather than one to add political power in the Senate.
After becoming an organized territory, the population increased very slowly during the early years and then very rapidly with the "Dakota Boom" from 1870 to 1880.[1] The population grew slowly for a number of reasons. Mainly, the Sioux Indians were considered very hostile and a threat to early settlers. They were gradually defeated and were not as severe a threat.[2] The population increase can largely be attributed to the growth of railroads, specifically the Northern Pacific Railroad. Settlers that came to the Dakota Territory were from other western territories as well as many from Northern and Western Europe. These included large number of Norwegians, Germans, Swedes, and Canadians.[3]
Life in Dakota was organized around agriculture and the fertile soil. Wheat became the main cash crop of the territory. Economic hardship hit the territory in the 1880s because of a decline in price of wheat and a drought that hit the territory hard. Other economic activities included mining and cattle ranching. Gold was discovered in the Black Hills and attracted more settlers to the area. This population increase in many ways led to more of a necessity for meat products and cattle ranching became prominent on Dakota's vast open ranges.[4]
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 | Dictionary. The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition Copyright © 2007, 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Updated in 2007. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved. Read more |
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| US History Encyclopedia. © 2006 through a partnership of Answers Corporation. All rights reserved. Read more |
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| Wikipedia. This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Dakota Territory". Read more |
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