The Frontier

Last year, I took HIST 361 - Western American History in the 20th Century - a very fascinating and interesting class!  On our first day of note-taking, we discussed Frederick Jackson Turner and others, & how thier spin on history have influenced us for over 100 years. 

There are several ways we can look at the Frontier: Little House on the Prairie, the Wild West, an almost fictitious era of America, as a topic of discussion and testing in school, Alaska, space, technology, still going on, etc.???

What exactly IS frontier?!

My notes from that day, discussing several views of what "The West" is/was:

History is more than the events - it is also the spin we place upon those events. Today, we have a different spin than years ago.

Historiography- spin placed on events in history

The FRONTIER West: 

link! Frederick Jackson Turner - from Wisconsin - is known as "The Father of Western History"  In 1893, at a Historical Conference, he presented a paper that is now known as "The Frontier Thesis", which gave folks a justification to study the West and migrate to the West.

Turner believed that the American distinctiveness came as people moved West.

Turner's arguments:

·        New environments, which made us innovators

·       "Free" land was available - anyone, from any background, could own land

·        The frontier diminishes class barriers

·       It became a "safety valve" - factory workers were less likely to revolt - rather, they went West.

Turner believed that the "Frontier" is over, using the census as proof that the West had lots of people living there.  Therefore, the 1st chapter of American History is over; there are new challenges ahead.

Changes to the Frontier came from:

·       Immigrants blend into our society to change who we all are

·       Urban centers changed how we think

·       Education became more available, causing us to move in a different direction

·       Idealism of the Frontier - Buffalo Bill, Disney & other theme parks, books, etc.

·       Technological developments

·       Industrialization

In the 1980's, a group of historians tried to eliminate "Frontier" from Western history 

In the 1990's/2000's, other historians claim that Frontier is still viable.  William Kronan noted limited resources as a Frontier.

Zone of intercultural contact/conflict = frontier, and lasts as long as there is conflict, and ends where one group takes control.

Some people are less interested in Frontier than the West.

The West as an IDEA:

link! Henry Nash Smith - humanities professor in Minnesota - believed that the West was an idea or myth; called it a garden.  The idea was dying off of Good Guys vs. Bad Guys.  Dime novels / pocket novels that gloried the West

BYU classes of Western Film or Western Novels look at the idea of the West

link!  Walter P Webb - from Texas - first looked at the West as a place or region.  He was a high school / University teacher & wrote the book, The Great Plains.

He said the eastern United States was like a 3-legged stool, with the legs being water, wood, and land.   In the West, (for the most part) there is no water or wood, therefore people learned to adapt.  His book looked at the adaptations:

·       barbed wire instead of wood fences

·       sod house instead of log house

·       windmills

·       irrigation

·       larger land units (farms)

"The key to understand the West is to compare it to the East"

The West as a REGION: 

Gerald Nash - a professor from University of NM - wrote the 1st book about the history of the West, link! 20th Century West - An Urban Oasis.  Argued that the West was urban from the beginning.  He pointed out that the West is the pacesetter of the Nation & cited the rise of conservatism in CA and Hollywood.

Question: Where does the West begin?  No one can agree

·       59% think it is the Pacific coast

·       15% think it is along the Sierra's

·       3% divide a line though the middle of NM, CO, WY, & MT

·       ...

·       22% think it is along the Mississippi River

Patricia N. Limerick - the 38th president of the Western History Association - wrote a book, link! Legacy of Conquest.  She is a professor of History at University of Boulder, CO.  She argued that while Turner divided eras in Frontier/Post-Frontier, you can become stranded and die today just as easily as you could in 1890.  She said, "the West is a permanent case study of conquest, and its consequences"  It is a messy story.  People try to do the right thing, then mess up.

She noted: 

·       The West is an arid place

·       The West is a place where the Federal government has a huge presence (70% of UT belongs to the Fed Government)

·       The West has a shared mystique with the Wild West

·       The West is remote from the centers of power in Washington, D.C. and Wall St.

·       The West is where most of the Native American populations reside.

     ·       The West's proximity to Mexico

·       The West has port looking out to the Pacific basin

·       the West has historically reliant on extracting Natural Resources while manufacturing was under-developed

·       The West has a history of colonialism through

o   absentee investment capital

o   a political system based on a territorial system