Farewell Frontier

Theodore Roosevelt was an outdoors man, rancher, conservationist,  and on March 4, 1905, he became President of the United States.  His inauguration parade was all western - with cowboys,  Custer's 7th Cavalry (minus Custer), and a group of Indian Chiefs including the old Commanche Ouanah and the Apache, Geronimo.  The whole thing was a tribute to the American past, the frontier in which all Americans in one way or another had been a part.

Even a decade before, the great open spaces in the West were rapidly disappearing.  The frontier, ever shifting westward had run out of room and had no where else to go.  The 1980 Census stated that "there can hardly be said to be a frontier line."

After a century of settling the frontier, the many results of the lost of open space affected all.  For the Indian, it was defeat, destruction and despair.  For the everyone else who loved wide open space,  it was the vast spreading farms, big cities, and ribbons of rail track - all eliminating the wild frontier.  The colonization of the Great West was complete.

Many believed that the western settler was the world's first truly free man - not just because of the Constitution's rights, but free because of the earth the settler farmed, the life he led.  The poor escaped to the West, the oppressed, and those with no hope escaped to start over with land, opportunity and hope.  The frontier exerted influence all the way back to the East where old society rules and habits lessened and self-sufficiency seemed to take root once more.  Instead of East going West, the West came to the East.

Today the frontier is not forgotten almost a century and a half later.  Rodeos, television, movies, even blue jeans, once the uniform of the cowpoke, is now a fashion statement.  Optimism, orneriness, generosity, courage, innovation - all remind us that there once was a vast wilderness where men and women could go to dream great dreams and do great deeds. 

Next time...A Christmas Log Cabin Dinner
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Today in Pioneer History:  "On December 20, 1803, the French surrender at New Orleans without a shot fired and turn over the city to the United States.

Muir Fights for the Future

John Muir was a mild-mannered guy but he had a passion - protecting natural resources for future generations.  He called the battle one between "landscape righteousness and the devil."  He wrote for Harper's Weekly and the Atlantic Monthly to educate the public.  In 1898, the forest reservation policy was in jeopardy.  Muir was recognized as the leader of the drive to save America's forests and wilderness areas.

In 1903 he went on a camping trip with President Theodore Roosevelt, who shared Muir's concerns.  President Roosevelt set aside 100 million acres of government timberland as a forest reserve, and established five national parks.  Roosevelt also designated 16 historic areas as national monuments under the Antiquities Act of 1906.  The Petrified Forest and the Grand Canyon were designated as national monuments in 1906 and 1908, but since have become national parks.

John Muir founded the Sierra Club in 1892 and kept an eye on the nation's forests.  He brought attention to the giant redwoods which were being used for everything from caskets to shingles to cigar boxes.  With conservationists he was able to save some of the redwood groves.  It wasn't until 1968 that the Redwood National Forest was established to protect these trees.

Muir died in 1914 but in his last decade he wrote journals where he recorded, "the forests of America, however slighted by man, must have been a great delight to God, because they were the best He ever planted."  We could use some John Muir today before our protected parks are sold off to private individuals and lost forever.

Next time...Farewell Frontier
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Today in Pioneer History:  "On December 17, 1903, near Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, Orville and Wilbur Wright make the first successful flight in history of a self-propelled, heavier-than-air aircraft. Orville piloted the gasoline-powered, propeller-driven biplane, which stayed aloft for 12 seconds and covered 120 feet on its inaugural flight. 

It's a Cowboy's Life

Next to the cattle, the most important element in a successful ranch were the cowboys.  Contrary to Hollywood movies and dime novels, the legend of the Wild West, always ready to defend the female and round up the bad guys was not entirely accurate.  Most cowboys existed as casual laborers, earning money from their abilities to ride and lasso. 

Their bosses gave the orders, often petty restrictions such as limiting cards games within the ranch acreage.  Cussing, liquor and gambling were all at the discretion of the owner's whim and many did not allow any of them.  Cowboys lived in the saddle for weeks at a time, through blizzards and heat waves, risked their lived at rounds up and cattle drives - and made $30 a month for 18 hour days, t
heir pay and work hours also set by the ranch owner.

There was, however, a romance to a cowboy's life - living on horseback in a wide open country.  American farm boys, Englishmen, Scots, German, Frenchmen, Black and Mexicans, were all attracted to the cowboy way of life.  Blacks and Mexicans, unlike those in films, made up a third of all cowboys.   In the 1870s and 1880s it was fashionable to run away from home to become a cowboy (also to join the circus!). 

The romance of the cowboy life brought many young men west but there was something more than kept them there. It was a male society, where courage was required to handle many dangers - rustlers, stampedes, rattlesnakes, droughts and blizzards.  These dangers developed a unique comradeship among those who rode.  There emerged a recognizable type of man who was a cowboy, described by Theodore Roosevelt...

"All cowboys have a certain curious similarity, existence in the west seems to put the same stamp upon each.  Sinewy, hardy, self-reliant.  Their life forces them to be both daring and adventurous, and the passing over their heads of a few years leaves printed on their faces certain lines which tell of dangers quietly fronted and hardships uncomplainingly endured." 

Next time...The Age of the Cattle Baron
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Today in Pioneer History: "On August 2, 1876,  Wild Bill Hickok was playing cards with his back to the saloon door. At 4:15 in the afternoon, a young gunslinger named Jack McCall walked into the saloon, approached Hickok from behind, and shot him in the back of the head. Hickok died immediately. McCall tried to shoot others in the crowd, but amazingly, all of the remaining cartridges in his pistol were duds. McCall was later tried, convicted, and hanged.