The quarterly of the Oregon Historical Society, Vol. 1, No. 1, March, 1900Oregon Historical Society
History
The quarterly of the Oregon Historical Society, Vol. 1, No. 1, March, 1900
Oregon Historical Society
Oregon -- History -- Periodicals
First of all, then, these pioneers were all frontier people. In 1842 the
only people who cared about the question of a migration to Oregon were
frontier people of these Western States; people already familiar with
the modes and the dangers of travel beyond the safeguards of
civilization. And this fact gives us our first test in the
classification of our pioneers—they were all frontier people. This
limitation was not intended, was not the result of any choice or purpose
of those concerned. As an applied test it developed itself from the very
nature of the case; for nobody but frontiersmen thought of going, or
cared to go.
Another important limitation developed itself in well-defined outlines
from the beginning of the movement and lasted throughout the real
pioneer period. It was the practical exclusion of capital from the
forces that originated its companies, purchased their supplies, or paid
for the help they needed on the journey. No people knew better than the
border Americans the power of money; but here again its absence was not
planned, was not desired. Its absence resulted from the nature of the
case; and the forces that moved those trains of farm wagons moved
without the stimulus of sustaining capital. The simple fact was that
capital saw in the migration of these pioneers no return of any
appreciable per centum of the funds to be expended. And thus it came to
pass that the wealthy were effectually excluded from the ranks of our
Oregon pioneers.
Frontier life has in it ordinarily less of poverty than any other
condition of society; a fact, doubtless due to the continual effort
necessary there to keep at all abreast of the incessant struggle against
the savagery of its surroundings. The long frontier line west of the
Mississippi in the early forties was aglow with a restless people
pressing westward, and but recently come there. The usual causes of
extreme poverty had not settled there; and so it came that few indeed
along this border line could be classed as dependent poor. And, perhaps,
none too poor to own a team and a good serviceable farm wagon, with
means sufficient to provision it with good wholesome food and clothing
for a journey to Oregon. But, if such there happened to be, we can
easily imagine the dismay it must have caused to have the name of such a
man proposed as a member of one of these companies. The fact, doubtless,
was that the unfitness of such a proposal prevented its occurrence.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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