Home > Westward Expansion > Exploring the West

As the British colonies on the eastern seaboard became more populated in the mid-1700s, colonists began to look beyond the Appalachian Mountains and contemplate westward expansion. Looking westward, they could only imagine the incredible riches the continent would offer to them. Not much information was known about the territory west of the Appalachians. A 1795 map did offer a fairly accurate picture of the western region of North America, but it mistakenly depicted several inland lakes as being considerably larger than...