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This test consists of 5 multiple choice questions, 5 short answer questions, and 10 short essay questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. How close were the travelers to the summit when they decided to rest and got snowed in?
(a) Three miles
(b) 1/4 mile
(c) 20 miles
(d) 50 miles

2. What did the travelers do before they headed across the desert?
(a) They wrote letters to send back to their relatives.
(b) They made hats to protect themselves from sand and sun.
(c) They prayed.
(d) They rested for a few days in the beautiful valley.

3. What was the Hastings Cutoff trail like?
(a) It was a clear path.
(b) It was marked by Hastings.
(c) It was barely discernible.
(d) It was beautiful every step of the way.

4. Independence, Missouri known for all of these except what?
(a) It was the crossroads for pioneers heading south along the Santa Fe Trail.
(b) It was the crossroads for pioneers heading west to California.
(c) It was the crossroads for pioneers heading east to New York.
(d) It was the crossroads for pioneers heading west to Oregon.

5. How did the Native Americans describe the Sierra Nevada?
(a) Rock upon rock
(b) The protective wall
(c) Entry to a new world
(d) Beauty and tragedy

Short Answer Questions

1. How many wagons did each family have?

2. How did they get the wagons down the canyons?

3. What did Reed want out west?

4. What did the note from Hastings on the stick say?

5. What did James Clyman tell the travelers?

Short Essay Questions

1. How did Charles Stanton helped the traveling party?

2. How did Virginia feel about her traveling clothes?

3. Explain the idea behind "manifest destiny."

4. Why did some of the people in Springfield question James Reed's ideas?

5. What was the Forty Mile Desert like?

6. How were tasks divvied up on the wagon train?

7. What did the families do in the evenings?

8. How many miles a day did the Donner Party plan to go, and what with their actual pace?

9. What did James Reed say that persuaded the man to take Hastings' Cutoff?

10. What happened to Mr. Hardcoop?

(see the answer keys)

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