Midterm 1 Study Guide

Below are some ideas, themes, issues, and questions you should be prepared to address in the first exam. Warning: This study guide is not comprehensive but does cover most of the material relevant to the final exam. Be sure to consider how the readings may apply to these issues and questions. When preparing for this exam, be sure to remember some of the following key themes of CA history:

1) Land of opportunity / CA Dreams

2) Racial and ethnic diversity

3) Relationship between CA and the nation

4) Water/environment

1) Be able to explain the reasons and method of the Spanish conquest of California. What was the role of the mission in this conquest and how did it shape early California? Be able to discuss the mission's role in the evolving relationship between the Spanish and California Indians.

2) How did the Mexican period differ from Spanish California? Why did the Mexican government secularize the missions in the 1830s? How did the natives fare during the Mexican period compared to the earlier Spanish period? Be able to discuss how American perceptions of California during the late Mexican period? What factors shaped the American conquest of California?

3) How did the Gold Rush affect the attitudes and lives of many Americans? What were the social conditions of early gold rush California, especially regarding gender, law and order, and race relations? How and why did the process of mining gold change and how did this affect the environment? Be sure to be able to discuss the issues and debates over gold mining and the environment that culminated in the North Bloomfield decision in 1884.

4) What were the sources of conflict between Anglos and other racial groups in the late 19th and early 20th centuries? What factors explain the growing conflict between whites and Chinese residents in the 1860s and 70s that eventually culminated in the Chinese Exclusion Act? According to Camarillo, how did race relations change in southern California in the second half of the 19^th century and what explains this? Be sure to consider economic, cultural, social, and political factors.