Part I, Lesson 4 (continued)
understand that people flocked to California for the gold, but many brought with them the beliefs and values of Manifest Destiny. Manifest Destiny and the assumptions and prejudices underlying it are thus a part of the larger issue of relationships between English-speaking and Spanish-speaking people in the western part of the United States. These issues and conflicts still exist today.

2. Give students Worksheet #4-1, Manifest Destiny Group Inquiry. Individual students fill out their own inquiry sheet during or after the group discussion. Have students work in groups and have several group spokespersons report on their findings.

3. You can present Resource #4-2, Progress of America, overhead after the group inquiry, or you may want to start off the lesson with it and follow with the group inquiry.

Note to teacher:
Tojetti's allegorical painting, Progress of America, of 1875, illustrates Bishop Berkeley's famous line, "Westward the course of empire takes its way." The central figure wears a liberty cap, personifying America. Flying putti (young children) dip down and crown her with a laurel wreath and lead her chariot, decorated with the American eagle and drawn by two white horses. Four maidens accompany her, representing agriculture, medicine, the arts and mechanics. In the right background, two Raphaelesque women follow holding a tablet; behind these two steams a railroad locomotive. To the left, a group of Indians and buffalo flee the advance of this personification of civilization. Note the contemporary (1875) dress of one maiden. A California poppy can be seen embedded on one of the chariot wheels.

The composition borrows from the early Renaissance. Chariot processions accompanied by childlike angels were popular, and the pose of America's arm reminds one of Michelangelo's Creation of Adam, in which God touches the finger of Adam and infuses him with life.*

*The West as America: Reprinting Images of the Frontier, 1820-1920, William H. Truettner, ed., Smithsonian Institution Press

4. Show students the color overhead and visual primary source on Manifest Destiny, the painting Progress of America. Also share with students the background information on Domenico Tojetti, Resource #4-3. You could make an overhead or provide students with a copy of the information. Have students continue to work in groups and use the Artwork Inquiry Sheet, Worksheet #4-2, to discover meaning in the painting. What do you think were the beliefs and values represented here? Is this painting consistent with the beliefs of Adams and O'Sullivan (see Student Worksheet #4-1)? What groups' values were these? Are there beliefs and values that have not been considered? Whose? Why not?

Part I, Lesson 4
Page 18
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