How would you rate the early pioneers who settled this country?

[AnArmyVeteran]

President Ronald Reagan used to talk a lot about the pioneers who settled this country. He always used their example to boast about the 'American Spirit'. But were these pioneers the best and the brightest, or were they just opportunistic and greedy people who wanted something for nothing?

That period of our history when most of what is today is called the United States of America can be looked at through two sets of glasses, one rose-colored and the other focused on reality. Everyone is familiar with how our country was formed, but a lot of people don't pause long enough to analyze the people of that era or what motivated them. Were they like the people Ronald Reagan portrayed as the best examples of the American spirit, or were they something less than Reagan's lofty appraisal of them.

[Uncle Joe]

1. They were regular people.

Thanks for the thread, AnArmyVeteran.

[Codeine]

2. they were regular people

and there is nothing wrong with that at all.

[proteus_lives]

3. The majority were hard-working folks. Like Americans have always been.

Yeah there were grifters and greedy people. But what society or time-period doesn't have those?

We couldn't have created the country if people hadn't been willing to work hard.

[Warpy]

4. Deadbeats and shiftless people weren't pioneers

since proving any claim to land meant building a shelter on it, at the very least and there were no lumberyards in those days.

Free land out west was never free. The price was measured in hard work.

However, deadbeats and shiftless people followed them and preyed on them in the usual manner: robbery, cattle rustling, horse thieving, gambling, and liquor.

[proteus_lives]

5. Also measured in blood.

No hospitals, no police, no super-market.

Starvation, disease, cruel weather, bad soil, hostile natives, hostile neighbors, criminals. Frontier life was not for the timid.

[Jamastiene]

So, some of my ancestors were nothing more than

"hostile natives" to you? Sad.

[Hell Hath No Fury]

25. Geez, maybe they were HOSTILE --

because everything they ever had was being taken from them and they were being systematically killed by those "pioneers". :crazy:

"Hostile natives" is clearly a eurocentric interpretation of the creation of the United States. As someone whose lineage runs on both sides of the matter, I still believe what happened to the native groups here was an obscenity that has not been fully addressed by our country and people.

[Jamastiene]

29. I can't get over how they were viewed as not even human.

Called savages and other such horrific things. That was really the attitude toward them. Yet, there really has been no atoning for it. What little land was given has slowly been whittled away. There is a rich, cultural history of the native American tribes. A lot of it has been lost, unfortunately. It just saddens me.

[Hell Hath No Fury]

44. We have had many movements here ---

that have made significant progress to righting what had come before -- the womens liberation movement, the black civil rights movement, the Farm Workers movement, and now we are working on LGBT rights. Our Japanese citizens who were sent to camps during WWII were finally acknowledged and apologized to.

But the Native Peoples Movement has never come to fruition in a way that has had the kind of impact that is needed -- lord knows they tried back in the 70s (and got killed and demonized for it). Instead, we "let them" have casinos and tell ourselves that's enough, all the old (and new) wrongs are taken care of.

I hope that we will one day make it right with them -- I think our country's karma depends on it.

[immune]

55. "lord knows they tried back in the 70s"

http://www.leonardpeltier.net/

[bobbolink]

58. We homeless people are still hoping that some of you will decide to take up our cause, too.

[proteus_lives]

26. That's what they were. Nothing wrong with that.

They fought for theirs and the pioneers fought for their own. It was the way of things.

[tjwash]

6. Grizzled, hairy faced bunch that liked to drink, and loved to fight.

And would think nothing of kicking the living crap out of anyone that got in the way of them doing their thing.

[Hell Hath No Fury]

7. They were regular people --

who took what was not theirs to take. :shrug:

[Erose999]

8. A lot of the "cowboys" the Reaganites derive their mythology from were actually African Americans

who left the South to seek better opportunities out West. The frontier was generally a place where the social climate wasn't antagonistic to Blacks, unlike the South and the cities of the East Coast.

And the early pioneers who went West were not necessarily "Americans", as the places they were migrating to were controlled by Native Americans, the French, Mexico, Russia, etc. The early Texans wanted an independent republic rather than statehood.

[immune]

60. And a lot of those cowboys were

Mexican vacqueros.

[leveymg]

9. Some of them had a huge amount of blood on their hands.

There were some 50-100 million aboriginal people in the Americas 500 years ago. Their mortality rate was about 90 percent during the first 350 years.

The term genocide applies.

[Jamastiene]

13. Yet, upthread, some of my ancestors have been called

"hostile natives."


:(

[leveymg]

22. I'm sure the actual terms applied at the time were far less gentile.

So have mine, as they were herded into gas chambers. Makes me acutely sensitive to the same general sort of persecution, and those who seem to forget that it's happened many times in human history. Even here. Just the technology and level of organization changes.

[Jamastiene]

30. The thing is that it keeps happening over and over again throughout

human history and people wonder how it was allowed to happen. So may act as if it could never happen again. It is awful what humans do to each other. Sometimes, I wonder if there is anything at all humane about human beings.

[leveymg]

35. Nothing says that it has to happen. Gandhi and MLK and some others provide an alternative path

and confirm that life can be constructive, peaceful and worth living.

We all have choices. Some are more aware of the need to make a choice for oneself. Being human takes a lot of work and is not easy.

[Jamastiene]

37. That is true.

I wish there were lots more people like MLK and Gandhi. They had power by being nonviolent and reaching people through self discipline.

[leveymg]

41. There are other kinds of pioneer I'd rather be

than the kind who carries a shotgun and scavenges gasoline. I'm afraid that's the new model man we've been presented for pioneer life in the 21st Century. There's gotta be something better than that.

[immune]

64. Well heck,

My own Dad used to call me a wild little Indian when I was a kid. Lovingly. Of course I didn't know what he was talking about until some years later when all that racial stuff enters into the social equation. So I've been called hostile a time or two, too. :evilgrin:

Its all good, though, if YOU like who you are and respect who THEY were.

[zipplewrath]

10. They were people with few real choices

Most folks came here because they had little in the way of a future where they were. There were many exceptions, but the vast majority came because where they were was in essence "worse" than coming here and starting over.

[postulater]

11. They were my family.

[closeupready]

16. Then, we're cousins.

n/t

[closeupready]

12. Blend of 1-3.

Not sure exactly in what proportions.

[Spike89]

14. a little confusing--pioneers

Although it may seem that the country sprang into being in 1776, it was being "settled" by Europeans well over a century prior. The pioneers of the 1600s were a pretty different bunch from the group in the mid 1800s that settled the western states. Even if we lump them together, I think history tends to focus on the noble aspects and the optimism of the pioneers and pretty much ignores or downplays the negative attributes of the pioneers.

We do hear that the "pioneers" of the 1600s were fleeing oppression in the old world, but we hear only "seeking opportunity" when talking about the 1800s migrations (with the exception of the Mormons). I've never bought the story that thousands of happy, prosperous, and content families just pulled up stakes and decided to travel to the West. The gold rush makes sense, but that wasn't families for the most part, and certainly didn't involve the pioneers Reagan was praising.

[joeybee12]

15. I do think they were courageous, however, they were also racist and rapers of

the environment.

[proteus_lives]

28. Really? All of them?

[bobbolink]

17. Any educated and thinking person knows that ANY group of people is a mixture.

What you have conveniently left out is that some of the pioneers were also Indian killers.

Who derived enjoyment from killing people they could see as beneath them.

[Jamastiene]

23. A lot of people do not know the real truth behind "scalping."

Native American scalps were worth money. Yet, to hear most people tell it, it was the other way around.

[bobbolink]

27. It is highly discouraging to me that "progressives" don't know any of this, and it never enters

their minds.

Or maybe I'm just in a bad mood. :shrug:

Thank you for posting an important bit of information... I often wonder how my Indian friends can be so forgiving.

[AnArmyVeteran]

47. The white man started that ghastly practice.

[Retrograde]

39. Don't forget that some of the pioneers were Indians

I think we should also take into account the people who came across the Bering Strait or landbridge or however and settled the continent some 12,000+ years ago - literally going where no man had gone before. They should get high marks for courage and daring.

[Dappleganger]

56. Yep, and some of them intermarried

which is how my dad came to be (and me).

[izquierdista]

18. Here they are....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=upvZdVK913I&feature=related

They're simple folk, farmers of the land, the common clay of the New West....you know....morons.

[grasswire]

19. pioneers were not the problem -- they were used by profiteers

And abused by the government, too. They were sold on the *scientific* idea of "dry farming" -- told that it was possible to support a family by farming a claim in land that had to be "dry" farmed. Of course, this was not so. But the railroads and the hucksters took advantage of the men and women who hoped for land and opportunity.

I recommend the book "Bad Land" by Jonathan Raban for a look at homesteading in Montana. Beautifully written and very informative.

Here's my grandparents' story. My grandfather worked in a plow factory as a boy in Ontario, and vowed that his children would never have to work in a factory. He took his family to Saskatchewan in the early 1900s, where they worked a claim trying to "prove" the land. To understand what they went through, read Wallace Stegner's book "Wolf Willow" which was written about his own childhood just miles from my grandparents' claim. Bitter, horrible times.

My grandfather was a skilled carpenter, so he was able to get some work in town in the summers too. But they could not make a living from the land and the weather, and had to abandon it.

Raban posits that the homesteading movement is what turned many rural citizens against city dwellers and against the federal government.

[old mark]

33. There were so many frauds committed against the good people it is amazing

anyone stayed. That there is a thriving west and midwest is a tribute to the good people who overcame the cheats.

mark

[immune]

50. They were used by profiteers ....

Homestead Act (1862)

http://www.enotes.com/major-acts-congress/homestead-act

By the late 1840s the homestead proposal attracted politicians who brought the subject before Congress, the most prominent being Andrew Johnson of Tennessee. Until this time the government had auctioned off public lands to the highest bidder, thereby allowing speculators to buy vast tracts of land and hold it off the market until the price rose so they could make handsome profits. The small farmer was effectively excluded from such land sales.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

You really have to read the whole article to know the rest of the sordid history of the profiteers of that time.

[AnArmyVeteran]

71. Thanks for your personal story and the links!

It's cool you have such a long account of your family's history. Family times were undoubtedly very interesting to listen to as a kid.

[grasswire]

72. yes, this is what they said: "we should have kept the mineral rights!"

:-)

[closeupready]

20. And what about all these treaties the US government made with indigenous people, and later flouted?

You can't deny that injustice which was done to PEOPLE WHO ALREADY LIVED HERE, and who called this land THEIR homes.

[maryf]

62. And are still flouting them...

look at the Seneca in NYS, still being harrassed with tax demands...not to mention the many never kept treaties with the Lakota and others

[damntexdem]

21. Well, they were visionary regular people.

But they were still a part of repeated waves of expropriation of land from those who had long lived on it

[pampango]

24. KInd of like immigrants in a way. Leaving behind what was familiar for a chance at a better life.

Uprooting and taking a chance is a risky endeavor. Of course, depending on what you are leaving behind the risk-reward ratio tilts in favor of taking the chance.

[Nikia]

57. I think that all immigrants of all types are courageous in a way

Even though they did not technically immigrate to another country, I would include many pioneers in this as well as former slaves and their families who left the South. In most cases, it is easier to just put up with whatever conditions to which one is accustomed. To leave the comfort of the familiar requires courage.
Most of them probably weren't the best and brightest. They probably were more individualistic than average. Some of them were not good people.

[alfredo]

31. Risk takers

[Greyhound]

32. Other. They were a mish-mash of malcontents, sociopaths, the desperately poor,

the dreamers, and those that chaffed under the yoke of "polite society".

They were definitely not the "best & brightest".

[Radical Activist]

34. They were mostly pawns of wealthy men.

Most history books don't give enough attention to how much the settlement of the colonies and westward expansion were driven by a relatively small number of financial interests such as coal, railroads, the Virginia Company, etc. They pioneers were there to make someone else money.

[grasswire]

43. +1

absolutely.

Just another kind of slavery, it was.

[dimbear]

49. pawn, pioneer, peon. all go back to Latin and mean

foot soldier.

[nadinbrzezinski]

36. Convicts, slaves, and other shiftless people who came

under false pretenses to work the land to produce the gold that was tobacco.

Now if you want myth, they were supermen who came over as free men and women...

But in reality this was a land of slaves and convicts, with a few power elites that brought them over...In fact, we have way too much in common with Australia, which is proud of that past. We have chosen to sweep it under the rug...

It don't agree with the national foundation myth.

[blindpig]

38. They were pirates who expropriated and exterminated indigenous

people. Maye they didn't think of themselves so, but that was the net effect. Racism and religion made possible for 'regular folks' to do that.

[mitchum]

40. Bloodsoaked

[Lucian]

42. How early are we talking about?

Clovis?
Pre-Clovis?
The Vikings?

Or the wannabe white men who take credit for "discovering" this country?

[hunter]

45. Walking from St. Louis Missouri to Oregon is one thing...

Walking from Siberia to Oregon is quite something else...

[defendandprotect]

46. "Heartland" where Native Americans lived...was opened by government so "pioneers" ...

could overrun and "war" with the Native American for the land --

Just more of the violent takeover of land by US government from Naive American!!


The basis of this is that the US government understand that you don't really won or

control land you don't occupy -- that's why they had to move "whites" in and onto the

land. Then, the forts!


Then, kidnapping Native American children -- putting them into Catholic and Mormon

Church schools where they were beaten, sexually abused in every way, killed, intimidated,

bullied -- to destroy their culture and relationships with their families!

[AnArmyVeteran]

48. And to justify murdering native Americans, Christians called them savages.

It was easier for all those god-fearing pioneers to label native Americans as 'savages' before slaughtering men, women, children and babies in order to steal their land and destroy their culture. Might does not make right. But right wingers believe it does.

[immune]

51. 6000 years of

dehumanizing those who had something the elites wanted. And they have always found plenty of foot soldiers amongst the illiterate masses to do their bloody bidding for them. Settlers were just the eager foot soldiers of the 1800s. We still haven't learned anything, even though they take everything of value from us, too. We may have college degrees and PhDs but what do we really know of the way the world works?

[defendandprotect]

67. .. and most every vile act of violence committed by "whites" and US government was

attributed to the "savages."

Demonizing always works -- still does!!

[AnArmyVeteran]

69. You are absolutely correct. Just the terminology changes.

Calling any Iraqi or Afghan citizen an 'insurgent' is justification for murdering them. We don't have wars any longer. We have 'Operation Iraqi Freedom' and similar terminology to cover up the carnage. We don't have murdered men, women, children & babies, we have 'collateral damage'.

I wonder how many Americans would cheer on an occupying military in the US when their families were murdered and labeled merely as 'collateral damage'. Sadly, too many people are unable to put themselves in the shoes of anyone else. When people can become so desensitized to the plight of others what have they become? Our country is in a civil war at this very moment over that one issue with the right wing's war against the most vulnerable in our society.

[immune]

59. I agree with what you said:

"The basis of this is that the US government understand that you don't really won or

control land you don't occupy -- that's why they had to move "whites" in and onto the

land. Then, the forts!"

That's why I usually refer to the westward ho settlers as human bulldozers. And it sure didn't take long for those settlers to lose "their" land to the banks and mortgage companies once it was "won". Who even knows what an allodial title is anymore?

[Safetykitten]

52. Stinky?

[Curmudgeoness]

53. Voted regular people, but think it was more desperate people.

These were most often the people who had very little options where they were, and were willing to try for a better life elsewhere. They were also the ones who the powers that be were throwing to the wolves---convincing them that there was something better for them if they settled the west. They knew that these would be the sacrificial lambs opening land for the exploiters.

[yella_dawg]

54. Other.

Serial killers.

[Bucky]

61. Thanks for posting. What an interesting topic.

I teach this stuff in high school. But my presentation of the content is pretty judgment neutral. The genocide of the Indians featured lots of willful ignorance on the part of most whites, peppered with some really horrible and deliberate acts of depravity and horror by those who put the "cut" in the cutting edge of civilization. It's not a new story--the ancestors of the American Indians did essentially the same thing to the prior inhabitants of the Americas. But it's still a pretty ugly story that needs to be taught along side the heroic bravery that so many pioneers faced.

[AnArmyVeteran]

70. Thanks Bucky, I'm sure you are very limited in what you can teach.

If you emphasized the ghastly treatment of native Americans I'm sure a lot of parents would protest. When President Obama mentions past abuses by our country the right wing screams and complains saying he is on an 'Apology Tour'. Those on the right do not want to be reminded (or taught) that our country has not had a perfect past. I believe when Obama mentions past US mistakes he is being a responsible adult, but those on the right whine like little children.

You must love your job. Ive always loved history and when I was in college I couldn't wait to get to my American history class because the teacher was so funny. His use of humor brought everything he said alive and made learning a pleasure. He would say things that literally cracked up all his students. Years later I visited the campus and I sought him out to thank him for making his class so much fun.

All the best!

[Duer 157099]

63. Many were wealthy and got large land grants, worked by slaves

Just like today

[The Straight Story]

65. None of the above, and how I explain it

They were people, like many others, looking for a better life. Indians were pioneers in their own time and way, certainly not blameless in how they expanded their own tribes. Pioneers did what other folks did - they sought at a better life and at times it meant that some folks would suffer because of it. Were the Indians wrong when they did the same?

[Xithras]

66. They weren't even regular people. They were overwhelmingly the POOREST people.

People with nice homes, successful businesses, and large amounts of wealth rarely give all that up to move out to some godforsaken stretch of undeveloped land, far from civilization and law, putting their lives and the lives of their children at risk.

By and large, the pioneers came from the poorest parts of society. The early slums, the lowliest sharecroppers, the barely skilled workers with little chance of employment. Their westward flight wasn't a search for wealth, or an opportunity to dominate. It was simply an attempt to escape the poverty that largely enveloped their lives.

A number of years ago, I traced one of my family lines back to their immigration from a German farming village in the 1820's, where they were all but slaves to their lordling (serfdom wasn't abolished in Hanover until the 1830's). According to a family history written in a family Bible in the 1920's, the father fled to Britain after his eldest daughter (13 at the time) became pregnant after being raped by the son of a local petty nobleman. The boys father put a bounty on their heads for "defaming his families name". From Britain, they went to America, where they ended up in an early New York slum. Twenty years later his son fled the slum and went West to Iowa, where he carved a farm out of the plain and established a line that would eventually generate my paternal grandmother.

It was, for many, a simple matter of survival.

[immune]

68. How a society treats its children speaks volumes about who/what they are.

Between kidnapping Indian children and putting them through hell on earth at godawful "mission schools", and the orphan trains that shipped white parentless children from city orphanages to god knows what kind of futures with anyone who would claim them at westward whistle stops are symptoms of a very sick society.

[PufPuf23]

73. None of the above.

Pioneers were a mix of violent sociopaths and empathetic people wanting a better life.

An example of a most "successful" and violent physical and cultural Genocide was committed against the American Indian and native ecology in the USA.

Desperate people of good heart also ecked out a new and hard life of hope as a by-product. Population grew and immigrants came hoping for the same better life. Genocide against peoples and nature continues and is exported. Cynically, "Benefit" is propagandized and disproportionate.