Frontier Culture and “Rugged Individualism” in the US

Monday, August 10, 2026

November 2017, Revised August 2020: "We investigate the Frontier Thesis and identify its long-run implications for culture and politics. We track the frontier throughout the 1790-1890 period and construct a novel, county-level measure of total frontier experience (TFE). Historically, frontier locations had distinctive demographics and greater individualism."

Posted by Dbt2 at 01:15 PM | 4 COMMENTS | permalink | Comment on This Entry |

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"Long after the closing of the frontier, counties with greater TFE exhibit more pervasive individualism and opposition to redistribution. This pattern cuts across known divides in the U.S., including urban"rural and north"south."

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Are they trying to say that Disney's Davy Crockett got his coonskin cap from Sears and Roebuck?

#1 | Posted by Corky at 2026-08-10 01:21 PM | Reply

Ahh, yes, the lone, self-reliant pioneer- a Howard Roark iconoclast with a Colt single army action revolver and a stetson hat- with his dependent family in tow, conquering the American West by sheer personal determination and grit!

Let's conveniently ignore the huge amount of government subsidized financial and infrastructure support, not to mention the forced displacement of indigenous tribes by masses of government-salaried soldiers carrying mass-produced weaponry manufactured by masses of poor immigrants back east.

BTW, organized collective actions (like barn raising, for example) are communist!!!!!!

#2 | Posted by NerfHerder at 2026-08-10 01:43 PM | Reply | Newsworthy 1

"opposition to redistribution"

Unless it's land, being redistributed from the Indians to the Settlers.

#3 | Posted by snoofy at 2026-08-10 03:25 PM | Reply

They were grabby shoot first a holes.

Never saw an Animal population they didn't want to destroy.

To deny the "Savages" any ability to sustain themselves.

The US Army facilitated the Slaughter of at Least 7 million Bison between 1872 and 1876, mostly in Kansas and Nebraska.

Hundreds of Millions of Passenger pigeons were killed between 1870 and 1880.

Mostly in Michigan and Wisconsin and Pennsylvania.

New York was played out by 1870.

America has the Worst record of Idiotic and Gratuitous Slaughter of Wildlife in World History.

It's truly Amazing there weren't More Extinctions.

EXCEPTIONAL NATION.

A Light Unto the World.

#4 | Posted by Effeteposer at 2026-08-10 11:12 PM | Reply