The frontier occupies a unique place in the collective imagination of many Texans. In his landmark work, The Great Plains, Walter Prescott Webb wrote: “New inventions and discoveries had to be made before the pioneer farmer could go into the Great Plains and establish himself. To the farmer, then, the Great Plains presented an obstacle which he could not, at the time he first confronted it, overcome. In time the Industrial Revolution was to develop agencies that enabled him to go forward and solve the problems of water and fence and extensive agriculture which hitherto had been insoluble. While these inventions and adaptations were being worked out, improved, and perfected, the agricultural frontier stood at ease, or more aptly, stamped about in uneasiness along the borders of the Plains country. In the interval of awaiting the Industrial Revolution there arose in the Plains country the cattle kingdom.†In this essay, your task is to analyze the significance of the Texas frontier. Discuss, the expanding line of Texas settlement and resulting conflict with Native Americans. Describe the different methods and organizations that conquered and moved Native Americans to reservations in a relatively short period of time. Explain the origins of the cattle trailing industry, its’ expansion after the Civil War, and what it accomplished. Finally, three inventions-railroads, barbed wire, and windmills-were especially important to the settlement of West Texas. Give details regarding the contributions and role of each.
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