Oh Hollywood

Hollywood is notorious for their use of stereotypes in there TV shows and movies. The show Gunsmoke was no exception. This show was filled with 1800's stereotypes, about cowboys, the wild west, and much much more. The main stereotype of this show that i found was the fact that every was a white male. This stereoype was crazy to me because the reality was that many cowboysof the time were black! It was not common to see black men on horseback rounding up cattle. This was a major false stereotype found in the show Gunsmoke. Also, the whole good also previls over evil thing, thats unfortunitly not true!! Many a time the bad guys would out run the good ones! Shoot outs were not always won by the good guys, merely the best shot. Its crazy to think that hollywood portrays these things. When in fact reality is oh so different from the movies and shows. However hollywood will be hollywood.

The True Life of a Cowboy

Hollywood often leads us to believe that cowboys were "Violent  gunslingers" or nomadic people who were somewhat of outlaws. When people think of cowboys they often think of the likes of Clint Eastwood or Jesse James. However these portrayals of cowboys are far from the trust. In reality, the lives of cowboys were hard. Though perhaps some truths can be found in the Hollywood portrayals, the majority of cowboy life was spent on cattle drives, and working for a living.


The definition of cowboy is one who herds cattle. This definititon alone goes against many of the stereotypes often given to cowboys. The word cowboy has grown to carry many negative connotations, such as being reckless, and wild. However these connotations are far off from the realities of cowboy life.


The true life of a cowboy was a lonely and a dangerous one. Cowboys spent most of there time on the "road" so to speak. They went on long cattle drives in order to round up cattle and bring it to ranches in order to be sold and butchered for meat. Along with that they would often have to go on roundups in order to find or in some cases save the cattle from dangerous places and situations.

Hollywood goes about portraying cowboys a much different way. Many movies have been made in which cowboys are made out to be "rough riders" and "violent" types of people. Movies such as The Good the Bad and the Ugly, and Wild West show cowboys as people totally different than who they actually were. Hollywood misses the point that cowboys lives were much more than shoot outs at high noon, and drinking and playing cards in the saloon. Cowboys lives were on the road, rounding up cattle, and fighting to survive the dangerous conditions.


Though many western movies are seen today as the best of all time. It is evident that they are not historically true. Hollywood added their own spin to the lives of cowboys, in order to add excitement and drama; however in reality that is what most of their lives were. After all, it is not easy living in a town with all men, no women to help out. This was probably a pretty exciting time, however not for the reasons Hollywood was looking for.

Photo Source: http://www.cartermuseum.org/collections/smith/collection.php

The Benefits of Gaming

Many people feel that gaming is an all around bad thing for children to do. They feel that playing video games is merely wasting time; time that could be used to study and do school work. However gaming is just as important to a child's growth and education process as the school work. I am not by any means saying that children should sit at home and play Halo or Madden 2011 all night. However there are games that can relate into what the children learn, and teach them in a way that they enjoy. Games such as Oregon Trail, and even other games like Call of Duty have elements in them which teach children as they play. Oregon trail connects directly with learning. This is a game that teaches the gamer what the families, and groups of people who moved west during the 1800's had to go through. We can learn just from playing this game, that westward expansion was expensive, dangerous, and not by any means easy. By merely playing this game one time, so much can be learned about this time period. For this reason i feel that "gaming" is not all bad. With the right games, the right message, and the right purpose, games can lead to scores of improvement in the class room.

Six word story

Big Family, long journey; father daughter.

Reconstruction vs. Civil Rights Movement

The era of the reconstruction saw many steps in the lives of African- Americans in the United States. However they did not gain the rights and freedoms which they deserved. This era of pain and suffering lasted over a hundred years, until something was done about it following the civil rights movement.

A sharecropping family

During the reconstruction, newly freed slaves were kept under a position of near slavery by laws passed in the south, the black codes. Due to the 10th amendment, the federal government could do nothing about these injust laws. Blacks were prevented from voting by polling tests, and taxes, which made it impossible for black citizens to vote. Also, these codes restricted blacks from buying land. All of this was not stopped becasue the successor of Lincoln, Andrew Johnson, had no interest in seeing to it that blacks had equal rights. The problem with all this was, that in the south, blacks had utterly no voice in politics. Whatever was made rule by the white politicans, was law. Due to this, African-Americans saw little progress. Many of these black codes stood in place until the civil rights movement of the 1960s. This was a serious problem for the African-Americans.

Sharecropping was a major issue that was being developed at this time. This was almost a loopoll in the laws, making the blacks as close to slaves as they could be. Basically, the white plantation and farm owners would give land to the former slaves to farm on. However this was not the freedmens land. The land still belonged to the farm owner, and thus a large portion of the proffit from the harvest had to be given to the farm owner. In this way, just as before, the plantation owners had a way of having others farm their land for them without having to pay much money. Slavery without the wips so to speak.

The civil rights movement was similar, yet different to the reconstruction era. Many of the same issues were being fought fought for, however the difference was, that now they were actually being fought for. The African- Americans finally had a voice, in that of Martin Luther King Jr. They now had someone who was willing to speak for the cause and fight for what he knew needed to be done. People such as him, and Rosa Parks, and many others were finally standing up, using their 1st amendments rights to stand up and rise together. This is no to say that this was time of violence and chaos, cause it mostly was not.

African-Americans were still, the 1960s, fighting for the rights to vote. Thought over a hundred years had passed, they still were being blocked out of polling stations by strict regulations. Due to this, they had no way to put there own officials in office: thus the government was still in some portions radically against them. As seen through the case of Rosa Parks, African-Americans were not even allowed to sit in the front of the bus. This is absurd. The free nation, many times referred to as the best nation in the world, clearly had some major problems.

The African-Americans during this time however, were better educated: thus could now use new ways to fight their cause. Through the use of sit-ins, nonviolent protests, and civil disobedience, they made their message clear.

These people, though still being treated as the inferior race, now had a fighting chance. This is a major difference from the post civil war era. They had a voice to speak there message, and a means to fight until they had the rights that they deserved.

Photo source(s): http://www.wicn.org/show/the-africanamerican-tradition &  http://www.kirkwood.k12.mo.us/parent_student/khs/plattes/topics11-13/topics11-13.html

The push for Education.

During the reconstruction era, with the slaves now free, many would say that they had more problems now then before. Being free, they now had no one to rely on; they were forced to rely on the government for much of there needs. Being that there were few blacks who knew how to read and write, it was a problem when it came time to establish schools. However they made due. The blacks became known as 'freedmen' and with the help of the north set up schools. However this was not easy. The freedmen had few teachers, few places to put schools, and no money for supplies. With all there problems, it was difficult  for everyone to be educated. However, the government came to the rescue; similarly to the way they so often do in this the 21st century. However, like throughout history, this did not just help. Many whites did not want there children being educated with blacks, and thus seperate schools had to be built. Many of the black or freedmen schools were burned and destroyed by the many anit-black groups forming. The freedmen however faced this struggle head on, and came out with education. The children would be educated at school, and teach their parents at night. Slowly but surely education was becoming available to the freedmen, as well as whites.

Image source: http://www.learnnc.org/lp/editions/nchist-civilwar/4439

Whats the point?

Immediately following the civil war, many people were unsure as to whether the south should be granted amnesty. For those who don't know, amnesty is defined as the act of an authority (as a government) by which pardon is granted to a large group of individuals (Marriam-Webster). In my opinion this argument should not have even taken place, and yet it is merely by human nature that it did. If we, the union, did not grant pardon to the southern states following the civil war, what would have been the point? Hundreds of thousands of innocent American lives shed, for what? It is a hard thing to do, however the Civil War was a situation in which, yes the south must pay in some way, however in a general sense, the north must forgive and forget. For if the north simply won the war, and yet did not forgive the south, then were they not back to the same place they were to begin with. It order for the war to mean something, the north had to provide amnesty to the south; and they did. I will leave you with the same words Abraham Lincoln did, in 1863, on the Gettysburg battle field. ""...We here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain; that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom; and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth."