COMMENTS

  1. Frontier Thesis

    The Frontier Thesis, also known as Turner's Thesis or American frontierism, is the argument advanced by historian Frederick Jackson Turner in 1893 that the settlement and colonization of the rugged American frontier was decisive in forming the culture of American democracy and distinguishing it from European nations. He stressed the process of "winning a wilderness" to extend the frontier line ...

  2. Frederick Jackson Turner

    Frederick Jackson Turner (born November 14, 1861, Portage, Wisconsin, U.S.—died March 14, 1932, San Marino, California) was an American historian best known for the " frontier thesis.". The single most influential interpretation of the American past, it proposed that the distinctiveness of the United States was attributable to its long ...

  3. PDF The Turner Thesis

    The Turner thesis reigned almost un¬ challenged until the early 1930 s. Since then a growing revolt has spread as one scholar after another has trained his heaviest guns on various aspects of the frontier hypothesis. The readings provide. sampling of the chief criticisms which have been raised.

  4. 17.9: The West as History- the Turner Thesis

    Theodore Roosevelt wrote to Turner that his essay "put into shape a good deal of thought that has been floating around rather loosely." 27. The history of the West was many-sided and it was made by many persons and peoples. Turner's thesis was rife with faults, not only in its bald Anglo-Saxon chauvinism—in which nonwhites fell before ...

  5. PDF Frederick Jackson Turner, "The Significance of the Frontier in American

    [Footnote in address as reprinted in Turner, The Frontier in American History, 1920] 1 In 1817 John C. Calhoun represented South Carolina in the U.S. House. Later in the year he was appointed Secretary of War by President James Monroe. [NHC note] ƒ fiAbridgment of Debates of Congress,fl v, p. 706. [Footnote in Turner, Frontier, 1920]

  6. The Significance of the Frontier in American History

    Frederick Jackson Turner. " The Significance of the Frontier in American History " is a seminal essay by the American historian Frederick Jackson Turner which advanced the Frontier thesis of American history. Turner's thesis had a significant impact on how people in the late 19th and early 20th centuries understood American identity, character ...

  7. What is Frederick Jackson Turner's "frontier thesis" and its criticisms

    Turner wrote this thesis in 1893, three years after the West was declared "settled" in 1890. Turner was concerned that by ending westward expansion, Americans would grow soft and lose their ...

  8. Frontier Thesis

    Frontier Thesis. Article by D.R. Owram. Published Online February 7, 2006. Last Edited December 16, 2013. The Frontier thesis was formulated 1893, when American historian Frederick Jackson Turner theorized that the availability of unsettled land throughout much of American history was the most important factor determining national development.

  9. 1920 Turner's Frontier Thesis

    The Turner's Frontier Thesis is a seminal work of American history, written by historian Frederick Jackson Turner in 1893. In his thesis, Turner argued that the existence of a continuously expanding frontier in the American West was a defining characteristic of American democracy and society. Turner argued that the frontier was not just a ...

  10. Frederick Jackson Turner, "Significance of the Frontier in American

    Frederick Jackson Turner, "Significance of the Frontier in American History" (1893) Perhaps the most influential essay by an American historian, Frederick Jackson Turner's address to the American Historical Association on "The Significance of the Frontier in American History" defined for many Americans the relationship between the frontier and American culture and contemplated what ...

  11. The West as History: The Turner Thesis

    Theodore Roosevelt wrote to Turner that his essay "put into shape a good deal of thought that has been floating around rather loosely." The history of the West was many-sided and it was made by many persons and peoples. Turner's thesis was rife with faults, not only its bald Anglo Saxon chauvinism—in which non-whites fell before the ...

  12. Frontier Thesis

    The Frontier Thesis or Turner Thesis, is the argument advanced by historian Frederick Jackson Turner in 1893 that American democracy was formed by the American frontier. He stressed the process—the moving frontier line—and the impact it had on pioneers going through the process. He also stressed results, especially that American democracy was the primary result, along with egalitarianism ...

  13. Turner Thesis

    Turner's thesis argued that American uniqueness and vitality lay in its land and vast frontier. ... Frederick Jackson Turner wrote "The Significance of the Frontier in American History" after the ...

  14. PDF Frederick Jackson Turner, The Significance of the Frontier in ...

    derick Jackson Turner, "The Significance of the Frontier in American History. 1893This brief official statement marks the closing of a great historic movement. Up to our own day American h. story has been in a large degree the history of the colonization of the Great West. The existence of an area of free land, its continuous rece.

  15. The Significance of the Frontier in American History

    Summary. Last Updated September 5, 2023. "The Significance of the Frontier in American History" was written by Frederick Jackson Turner, delivered as a conference paper at the annual meeting of ...

  16. Frederick Jackson Turner

    Frederick Jackson Turner. "The emergence of western history as an important field of scholarship can best be traced to the famous paper Frederick Jackson Turner delivered at a meeting of the American Historical Association in 1893. It was entitled "The Significance of the Frontier in American History." The "Turner thesis" or "frontier thesis ...

  17. Turner and the Frontier Myth

    It is the frontier thesis. that has embodied the predominant American view of the American. past. Turner wrote his memorable essay, "The Significance of the Frontier in American History," during that period of growing. tension between the Eastern and Western United States which. culminated in the Bryan campaign of 1 896.

  18. Frontier Democracy: The Turner Thesis Revisited

    tion was overwhelmingly rural when Turner was born in 1861, it had become nearly half urban by the time he wrote his frontier essay, and by 1920, when Turner published a book of essays reprinting his much acclaimed frontier piece, a majority of the American people lived in urban areas. As small-farm America disappeared, Turner, an affec-

  19. The Turner Thesis: A Problem in Historiography

    THE TURNER THESIsS A PROBLEM IN HISTORIOGRAPHY 229 theory wanting in explaining American in-stitutional growth. Turner was emotionally and intellectually interested in the American scene; the remote "seed" of the Teutonic theorist stood in a poor second place in his ideas on the American development.14 As he wrote in his autobiographic letter to

  20. 2 The Making of a National Identity: The Frontier Thesis

    For example, Dr. Francis Walker, President of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, after receiving a copy of the paper wrote to Turner that he hoped to "find time in the future to read the paper." 4 Close Yet as Turner continued to develop the ideas of his paper, his frontier thesis not only became popularized, but also became "the ...

  21. Frederick Jackson Turner's

    Frederick Jackson Turner's Frontier Thesis 1 5 1 II The Frontier Thesis was Turner's answer to the challenge of putting his ideas about history into practice. Its meaning, then, does not simply lie in a new interpretation of the past, but in a new use of the past for the present. This implied building a theory whose very structure would

  22. The Turner thesis concerning the role of the frontier in American

    The Turner thesis concerning the role of the frontier in American history by Taylor, George Rogers, 1895-1983, editor. ... .J.H. Hayes.--Frederick Jackson Turner, by A. Craven.--The frontier and the 400 year boom, by W.P. Webb.--A meaning for Turner's frontier, democracy in the Old Northwest, by S. Elkins and E. McKitrick.--Frontier democracy ...