How frontier experience had an impact on women’s role

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American historians assumed that the process of extending the frontier westward began 1607 with the establishment of the first colony in Jamestown. It ended around 1890 when the U.S. census bureau defined the frontier “[…] as an unbroken line of settlement with two or fewer people per square mile […].” This criterion led Frederick Jackson Turner in 1893 to the conclusion that there was no frontier line, due to westward movement and expanding settlement, anymore.

Turner noted the great significance of the frontier to the development of the American society and underlined the frontier’s economic and political contributions. In addition he argued that the spirit of the West was very important, because it “[…] encouraged men to rebel against eastern conservatism, particularly by shaping new policies […] and to liberalize their political views in support of democracy.” When he talked about frontier experience he talked about the story of men’s confrontation with the raw force of the West.
“The wilderness masters the colonist. […] It takes him from the railroad car and puts him in the birch canoe. […] at the frontier the environment is at first too strong for the man. He must accept the conditions which it furnishes, or perish, and so he fits himself into the Indian clearings and follows the Indian trails.
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When analyzing history it is important to have a look at the people. From this point of view frontiers were not just regions at the edge of a settled area, but also places were different people – men, women and children – had to manage their lives. Therefore the topic of this term paper is to investigate how frontier encounters and experiences had an impact on women’s role. For this reason the term paper is structured as follows: it starts with the description of a U.S. federal law from 1862, the Homestead Act. This law gave nearly everyone the opportunity to “acquire” property. In addition it was a main reason for many men, women and families to move west. Afterwards the circumstances of homesteading – housing conditions, dangers of frontier life and division of work – should be investigated in order to find distinctions between frontier life and the everyday life in the eastern regions. Finally, the analysis of gender role and family life at the frontier should provide evidence to answer the question of this term paper.