Great Plains Studies, Center for
Date of this Version
1991
Abstract
Frederick Jackson Turner's is only the most compelling of many accounts that portrayed the frontier West as a region of opportunity where sturdy individuals from modest social and economic backgrounds could get a leg up o~ the ladder of success. This frontier was a healthier place than longer settled areas because westerners valued newcomers for their hard work, for what they could do, not for their family status or wealth, and individuals achieved whatever level of success their own abilities and motivations allowed. But as British and even eastern travelers to the frontier often reported, this egalitarianism often had a negative side, a relentless urge to level anything that might be taken as putting on airs or presuming oneself to be superior to anyone else.
Comments
Published in Great Plains Quarterly 11:1 (Winter 1991). Copyright © 1991 Center for Great Plains Studies, University of Nebraska–Lincoln.