[northwest_al] Additional Incentives to Move.
- From: Brad <viola@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: northwest_al@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Wed, 21 May 2003 08:21:10 -0400 (EDT)
Hola;
A number of other contributing factors may well have made moves West more
likely in the later part of the 1800s.
I) Land speculators had advertised Western lands for years. Yet a much
stronger motivator was word-of-mouth, letter, and newspaper communications,
from friends and relatives already out West, verifying that the land was 1)
affordable, 2) available, and 3) of better quality. Moreover, similar
trustworthy reports were necessary specifying that 4) the journey Westward was
do-able (acceptable riskiness, not too time-consuming, bearable, etc.).
II) Somewhat similar factors are summarized and elucidated better than I
can at <a target=_blank
href="http://www.ragz-international.com/westward_movement.htm";>http://www.ragz-international.com/westward_movement.htm</a>
"In 1869 transportation between East and West was improved when the Union
Pacific and Central Pacific railroads met in Utah. The importance of the
wagon trails soon began to diminish. Twenty years later irrigation ditches
were making the dry lands bloom. More railroads were crossing the once
desolate desert. The Indians were becoming almost a forgotten people. The high
plains had entered upon their last phase as "cow country."
This same link provides an overview of the "Meaning of the frontier...
1893, Frederick Jackson Turner... what the frontier experience had done to
shape the United States."
III) I don't want to ruffle any feathers, but realistically I wonder if
people might have also moved because they felt there were too many blacks in
NW AL and that in the West there would be fewer. Has anyone heard about
this being given as a reason for moving?
Keith Longley Bradford (Megan is my wife)
Brad
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