Fredrick Jackson Turner Essay

Fredrick Jackson food moulder was an the Statesn Historian who examined the unique characteristics that defined American Culture. food turner was a easy educated man receiving his Bachelor of Arts degree in 1884 and his Masters Degree in 1888. He continued his education at John Hopkins University and veritable a PhD in history. He taught most of his professional life at the University of Wisconsin and then Harvard in 1910. Rise of the West, and Significance of Sections in American history for which he received the Pulitzer Prize have become standards in the study of American History. He is most well known for his boundary Thesis which he genuine in 1893. Shortly, after the United States Census Bureau in 1890 declared the American Frontier officially closed, Jacksons interest was peaked and he set give away to study and analyze Americas relationship with its own frontier. In 1893 he publicly r about this dissertation in Chicago at the Worlds Columbian Exposition.He stated Up t o our own day American history has been in a large degree the history of the colonization of the Great West. In 1921, Fredrick Jackson food turner published a full length text titled The Frontier in American History. In it he explores his thesis which stated The existence of an area of free land, its continuous recession, and the advance of American settlement westward, explain American development (Turner 1) Turners fascination with the frontier and probably his inspiration for studying and taking into custody the importance of the American Frontier in American History stems back to his childhood. He grew up in in Portage, Wisconsin. His backyard bumped right against the meeting of two bodies of water Fox River and Wisconsin River. The small town had many characteristics that would have been bring in frontier town. When he describes his childhood he tells of the Native American teepees where he fished as a boy. Native Americans were often in town to dish out various pieces of c raft and jewelry to the local stores. To understand America and its culture it was extremely important to understand the frontier and Americas connection to it. Turner believed that the frontier Americanized Americans. This Americanization lasted close to 300 years, starting at the colonization of the New England coast and continuing until the west was completely settled. The free land offered in the west, the frontier, was a recourse net which offered property ownership opportunities to state who traditionally could no afford to own anything. In the text of The Frontier of American History, he comments So long as free land exists, the opportunity for a competency exists, and economic power secures political power (Turner 32).Discontent and poverty revolts were almost unhearable in those 300 years. He argues that the frontier produces and shapes a particular type of man who is full of coarseness and strengthacuteness and inquisitiveness, (of) that practical and inventive turn of mind(full of) restless and nervous energy that buoyancy and exuberance which comes with freedom. (Turner 37). Turners believed that the western movement was the main factor contributing to the basis of Americans institutions and culture. Conditions of living and conquering the wilderness permanently altered the European settlers of the New England coastline to a new national breed. Turner goes on to compare the American Frontier to Europe. In explaining their similarities, he states What the Mediterranean Sea was to the Greeks, breaking the bonds of custom, offering new experiences, calling out new institutions and activities, the ever-retreating frontier has been to the United States directly (Turner 38). Turner continues to explain that to the speckle Europe had its own frontiers, it effected them more remotely. Turner believed that the frontier shaped the American character and the closing of the horse opera Frontier signified the United States graduating from its initial devel opment into something much more mature.Turner summaries by commenting four centuries from the discovery of America, at the end of a hundred years of life under the Constitution, the frontier has gone, and with its going has closed the first period of American history (Turner 38). In The Frontier of American History, while he writes about America as an example he gives a detailed general explanation that he believes could be used in understanding other nations cultural growth patterns. Fredrick Turner believes that the growth and settlement is the first period of progress in any nations development. This expansion is followed by followed by periods of social and economic development. Each of which is frontier all its own. Turner explains with an exampleStand at Cumberland Gap and interpret the procession of civilization, marching single filethe buffalo following the trail to the salt springs, the Indian, the fur-trader and hunter, the cattle-raiser, the pioneer farmerand the fronti er has passed by. Stand at South flow in the Rockies a century later and see the same procession with wider intervals between (Turner 12) He believed that the American West created the first truly free man. The European Frontier was nothing more than people recreating Old World values and deferring to authority. The frontier in America had no law, no authority, and men lived by their wits. America thinks of its frontier as being within the country not at the edge. There is no line which separates the frontier from settled land. Americas frontier is transient and terrestrial. However, the European frontier is fixed, and completely permanent. Turners research and thesis contrasted strikingly with his historic contemporaries who believed that America was based on Europe. And it was the European historical legacy brought over with the colonists that gave America its uniqueness. Fredrick Turner believed that the American Frontier and the surrounding experiences should be respected and s poke about of with dignity. Of phone line there are several flaws in his thesis. He failed to speak about the effect of the American Frontier on women and minorities. Turners theory was deemed ethnocentric and nationalistic. His premise also showed a large separation between rural American and the future urban or city culture. Another problem with his safety net proposal is that it is not true for anything after the Civil War. In the slavery ridden South many blacks sought refuge in the frontier in advance the Civil War. However, after the Civl War, the poverty stricken south it was impossible for people to have enough money for transportation, and setting up homesteads in the West.It is important to posting that Turners Frontier Thesis goes head to head with the theory that slavery was the defining factor in American history. The government actually gave forward more free land after the official closing of the American Frontier than in all the years preceding 1890. Turners thes is and research were not, at the time of its original, publication embraced. Much of that coldness he received from his peers was due to his blunt, forceful nature and writing style. When he spoke about his Frontier Thesis, he commanded his fellow historians to turn their mindset from European history to the American West. He comments often that American Historians had it all unconventional and he was right. His aggressive preaching may have turned other researchers off to even considering his thesis. Fredrick Jackson Turner does a good job of fleshing out his thesis. I do agree that the American Frontier had a huge effect on defining what America is and who Americans are. I do think that Turners Frontier Thesis has its problems which I stated above. I think it is important to point out that understanding the birth of truly American Ideals you must look at several different theories developed by various Historians. I agree with the points that Fredrick Turner makes. Especially conc erning how settlers of the frontier needed to be self sufficient and self governing. Regardless, if historians agree with Turner or agree to disagree the impact of his Frontier Thesis, is indisputable. He introduced the idea that daily events of regular people make up history that is it is true history. He nurtured and detailed his belief that the physical land can be a major factor in defining and shaping a culture, particularly the American Culture. Fredrick Jackson Turner breathed life into the American Western landscape, letting the Frontier transform from a mere setting to a powerful tool in chiseling the Americas historical and cultural legacy.BibliographyHutton, T.R.C. Beating a Dead Horse? The keep Presence of Frederick Jackson Turner in Environmental and Western History. International Social Science Review (2002) 47+. Questia. 10 Dec. 2005 .Ritchie, Robert C., and Paul Andrew Hutton, eds. Frontier and component Essays in Honor of Martin Ridge. 1st ed. San Marino, CA Hunt ington Library Press, 1997. Questia. 10 Dec. 2005 .Turner, Frederick Jackson. The Frontier in American History. New York Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1921. Questia. 10 Dec. 2005 .White, Richard, and Richard White. Chapter Ten When Frederick Jackson TurnerAnd Buffalo bankers bill Cody BothPlayed Chicago in 1893. Frontier and Region Essays in Honor of Martin Ridge. Ed. Robert C. Ritchie and Paul Andrew Hutton. 1st ed. San Marino, CA Huntington Library Press, 1997. 201-211. Questia. 10 Dec. 2005 .