John Gast’s 1872 painting American Progress is one of the most recognizable images depicting American westward expansion.
Analyze the Gast painting and answer the questions below.
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A colored painting shows a larger-than-life white female in a long, flowy white gown floating above a mostly flat landscape with few trees. She is facing left. On the land below are bison and Native Americans moving westward, or left, and behind them are white settlers in a wagon and stagecoach also heading west. The right side shows a farm being tilled by two white male settlers. Behind them are three trains on tracks moving left. A river with different-sized boats is at the top right side.