Individualism has become somewhat of an anachronism in a mass society, but its obsolescence today is part of the current American tragedy. The buoyant self-confidence which it inspired has made much of the American dream a reality. Legislation, it is true, has taken the place of free lands as the means of preserving democracy, but it will be a hollow triumph if that legislation suppresses this essential trait of the American character, its individualism. No intelligent person today would recommend a return to the laissez-faire individualism of the Social Darwinists of the late nineteenth century, but it must be admitted that a society emphasizing the worth of the individual and dedicated to principles of justice and fair play, the banner under which the frontiersmen of the West Branch operated, has genuine merit. Whether the historian is analyzing old frontiers or charting new ones, the timeless question remains: does man have the intelligence adequate to secure his own survival? The old frontiers, such as the Fair Play territory of the West Branch of the Susquehanna, were free lands of opportunity for a better life, and the history of the westward movement of the American people gives ample proof of their conquest. But the new frontiers are not so clearly marked or so easily conquered. Perhaps a re-examination of the history of the old frontiers can give increased meaning to the problems of the new. This investigation was attempted, in part, to serve such a purpose. The intelligent solution to the problem of survival for the pioneers of the West Branch Valley was fair play. The ethnography of the Fair Play settlers is the record of the democratic development of an American community under the impact of the new experience of the frontier. FOOTNOTES: [1] P. 2. [2] _The Oxford Universal Dictionary_ (Oxford, 1955), p. 637. [3] Solon and Elizabeth Buck, _The Planting of Civilization in Western Pennsylvania_ (Pittsburgh, 1939), pp. 431 and 451. [4] _See_, for example, Dunaway, _A History of Pennsylvania_, p. 146, and _The Scotch-Irish of Colonial Pennsylvania_, pp. 159-160; _also_, Leyburn, _The Scotch-Irish_, p. 306. [5] Turner, _The Frontier in American History_, p. 1. [6] _See_ Chapter Two. [7] Quoted by Ray Allen Billington in his introduction to Turner, _Frontier and Section_, p. 5. [8] _Pennsylvania Archives_, Second Series, III, 217-218, 518-522. [9] This pride was notably demonstrated in the insistence of the Fair Play settlers that a stand be made at Fort Augusta following the Great Runaway. Previous to this, they had pleaded for support for "our Common Cause" in the defense of this frontier. _Pennsylvania Archives_, Second Series, III, 217. [10] _Pennsylvania Archives_, Second Series, X, 27-31, 417, and Fifth Series, II, 29-35. [11] Quoted in Clinton Rossiter, _The First American Revolution_ (New York, 1956), pp. 4-5. [12] Turner, _The Frontier in American History_, p. 37. [13] _Ibid._