The American Frontier was considered one of the last great opportunities of the
United States. Its whole existence made America what America was intended to be, a
land to start over, a new ground which for many would result in the eventual expansion
and diminishing of the frontier. Many arguments arouse around the 1890's to whether
this great opportunity was coming to a close. These arguments brought about
a lot of controversy for the time and even for the present day. In "The Significance of the
Frontier in American History" written in 1893 by Frederick Jackson Turner several points
are called upon to show the existence of this frontier was discontinued.
The first of these points was that in the time of 1890, there was no longer a
frontier line. He argues this point by stating that the unsettled lands beyond the so-called
"frontier-line" has so many areas of settlement that there can no longer be a frontier.
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A New FrontierHe
states, " by 1880 the settled area had been pushed into northern Michigan, Wisconsin, and
Minnesota, along Dakota rivers, and in the Black Hills region, and Montana and Idaho
were receiving settlers....... The superintendent of the census for 1890 reports, as
previously stated, that the settlements of the West lie so scattered over the region that
there can no longer be a frontier line" he states that the U.S. has witnessed a change along
with its movement to the West, it digressed with this movement causing the average
person to become a frontiersman, a survivalist, learning and using his new found skills to
survive. It was a rebirth of life in America, a chance for an ordinary person looking to
start on new ground to experience how simple yet rugged life could be, it also gave him a
chance to...