Synopses & Reviews
Books, art, and movies most often portray the frontier army in continuous conflict with Native Americans. In truth, the army spent only a small part of its frontier duty fighting Indians; as the main arm of the federal government in less-settled regions of the nation, the army performed a host of duties. The Frontier Army in the Settlement of the West examines the armyand#8217;s nonmartial contributions to western development. Dispelling timeworn stereotypes, Michael L. Tate shows that the army conducted explorations, compiled scientific and artistic records, built roads, aided overland travelers, and improved river transportation. Army posts offered nuclei for towns, and soldiers delivered federal mails, undertook agricultural experiments, and assembled weather records for forecasting.
The "multipurpose" army also provided telegraph service, extended relief to destitute civilians, and protected early national parks.
Synopsis
The Frontier Army in the Settlement of the West examines the armyandrsquo;s nonmartial contributions to western development. Dispelling timeworn stereotypes, Tate shows that the army conducted explorations, compiled scientific and artistic records, built roads, aided overland travelers, and improved river transportation.
Description
Includes bibliographical references (p. [371]-435) and index.
About the Author
Michael L. Tate is Professor Emeritus of the Charles and Mary Martin Chair of Western History, University of Nebraska, Omaha. He received his Ph.D. from the University of Toledo in 1974. His publications include The Frontier Army in the Settlement of the West (OU Press, 2001), Indians and Emigrants: Encounters on the Overland Trail (OU Press, 2006), and The Great Medicine Road Volume I: That Restless Eager Enterprise, 1840-1848 (AHC, forthcoming).
Table of Contents
Discoverers: military scientists, ethnologists, and artists in the new empire -- Encountering the elephant: army aid to emigrants on the Platte River road -- Across and on the wide Missouri: the army's role in western transportation and communication -- Posse comitatus in blue: the soldier as frontier lawman -- Dining at the government trough: army contracts and payrolls as community builders -- Uncle Sam's farmers: soldiers as agriculturalists and meteorologists -- Hippocrates in blue: army doctors on the frontier -- Reform the man: post chapels, schools, and libraries -- Sharpening the eagle's talons for domestic duties: the army in public relief work and in protecting the national parks -- In defense of "Poor Lo": military advocacy for Native American rights -- Documenting the experience: soldier journalists, autobiographers, and novelists -- Life after soldiering: entrepreneurs, investors, and retirees.