Frederick Jackson Turner

That coarseness and strength combined with acuteness and inquisitiveness; that practical, inventive turn of mind, quick to find expedients; that masterful grasp of material things, lacking in the artistic but powerful to effect great ends; that restless, nervous energy; that dominant individualism, working for good and evil, and withal that buoyancy and exuberance which comes with freedom - these are the traits of the frontier.

So long as free land exists, the opportunity for a competency exists, and economic power secures political power.

The frontier has gone, and with its going has closed the first period of American history.