English: Frederick Jackson Turner, c.1890

en:Category:United States history images

Born in en:Portage, en:Wisconsin in en:1861, Turner began his career in newspapers, and in 1880 entered the en:University of Wisconsin. Following his graduation with an MA in History, he went on to en:Johns Hopkins University for his doctorate, returning to Wisconsin as Professor of History in en:1889. It was there tha he developed his most famous work "The Significance of the Frontier in American History" which became recognised as a seminal work in the understanding of the reasons for, and the benefits of territorial expansion from the Atlantic to the Pacific coasts. He describes the effects of the expansion of the frontier on the American character, its nationalism and individualism and so on, much of which he attributed to this frontier mentality. Turner died in en:1932.