Frontier Illinois (History of the Trans-Appalachian Frontier) [Hardcover]

James Edward Davis (Author)

Book Description

Series: History of the Trans-Appalachian Frontier | Publication Date: January 1999

"O, this is a delightful country!" one newly arrived settler wrote to a friend back East. Indeed, as James E Davis shows, many newcomers found Illinois a hospitable and relatively peaceful place in which to start a new life. Davis tells a sweeping story of the making of the state from the Ice Age to the eve of the Civil War. He describes the earliest Indiana civilisations, the coming of LaSalle and Joliet and the founding of the French colony, the brief history of British Illinois, and the complex history of subsequent settlement, which brought distinct cultural traditions to Illinois. A major theme of this book is the relative absence of violence, at least after the Black-hawk War of 1832, even over explosive issues such as slavery. Throughout, Davis keeps the reader mindful of Illinois' ordinary people. James E Davis begins his volume on the frontier period in Illinois history with three eyewitness accounts of the settlement process during its highest tide, the 1830s. We hear Sarah Aiken, of northern New York, David Henshaw, of Massachusetts, and Charles Watts, an Englishman, describe what Illinois life was really like in those days, and why Sarah wrote to a friend back home, 'O, this is a delightful country!' Professor Davis then looks far back into the Illinois of the glaciers, and the series of Indian civilisations that changed the land. These included the villages around Cahokia, where 20,000 people lived in the year 1100 CE, more than in any city in Europe. The French explorers La Salle and Jolliet appear next, the precursors of other French men and women who created stable settlements like Kaskaskia and the rest of the old French colonial zone, in uneasy accommodation with the Indians. The brief history of British Illinois, and the Revolutionary War which assured Illinois' American future, then follow. Davis then traces the complex settlement process, first from Kentucky to the south, and later from New York, Pennsylvania, and Ohio to the east, bringing distinct cultural traditions to Illinois. One of his most important findings, and a major theme of this book, is the relative absence of violence, at least after the Black-hawk War of 1832, which removed the last substantial Indian presence from the state. Among whites, however, whether they came from the upland South or from Yankee roots, struggles over land, court houses, county seats, railroads, markets, and even the explosive fugitive slave question were resolved with a minimum of bloodshed. Davis explains all of these events in Illinois' early history and many more. Railroads started crisscrossing the state in the 1840s; Chicago began its role as the gateway between East and West; and in the 1850s, on the eve of the Civil War, Illinois passed beyond its frontier period. Throughout the book, James E Davis keeps the reader mindful of what happened to Illinois' ordinary people. This will not surprise those familiar with his best-known previous work, Frontier America, 1800-1840, a path-breaking synopsis of the early demographic history of Trans-Appalachia. For many years a professor of history at Illinois College in Jacksonville (the oldest continuing higher-educational institution in the state), and a renowned teacher there, Davis brings to life in this book the frontier period of Illinois history.

Editorial Reviews

From Kirkus Reviews

A comprehensive, readable history of this distinctive prairie state before the Civil War. Davis (History/Illinois Coll.; Frontier America, 18001840, not reviewed) takes us from the time when what is now the state of Illinois was nothing but uninhabited land to the year in which its previously defeated senatorial candidate, Abraham Lincoln, became president of the US. In between, Illinois passed from native through French and briefly British, finally to American hands and went from a frontier wilderness to a prosperous urban society. Davis analyzes this complex transformation in consistently lively prose, scanting neither the main characters nor the more impersonal forces that brought this change about. Native Americans are front and center through much of the story. So, too, are the diverse populations of European settlersFrench and post-Revolution Americans uppermostand African-Americans, both slave and free. What helped make this most south-reaching midwestern state distinctive was its dual in-migration of southerners moving north, often with their slaves, and easterners moving west with their free-soil culture. Out of the original territories of the Old Northwest, established by the great Ordinance of 1787, Illinois became a state in 1818, after political shenanigans that won it statehood without the minimum number of inhabitants required by law and with the questionable addition, from the Wisconsin Territory, of thousands of square miles that included the land on which Chicago, the Midwest's greatest city, rose. Throughout all of these developments, and especially the gradual erosion of slavery, this ``far distant country'' remained comparatively free of violence and attached to communal norms. Davis ends his tale when Illinois, no longer a frontier land, had become the most highly urbanized of any state west of the Appalachians on the eve of the Civil War. This deft synthesis of existing knowledge is likely to become the standard modern history of Illinois. (13 b&w photos, 5 maps, not seen.) -- Copyright ©1998, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Review

"A comprehensive, readable history of this distinctive prairie state before the Civil War...This deft synthesis of existing knowledge is likely to become the standard modern history of Illinois."--Kirkus Reviews "Davis provides an incisive portrait of prairie society... A fresh and sophisticated survey of early Illinois."--Choice "Extensively researched, and with excellent endnotes, Frontier Illinois is an important study. A lively account of how the frontier gave shape to the later state, it questions traditional stereotypes of the West and offers a new outlook as to the real nature of the Illinois frontier." --Journal of the Early Republic

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 515 pages
• Publisher: Indiana Univ Pr (January 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0253334233
• ISBN-13: 978-0253334237
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 5.9 x 1.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,265,561 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Touching the Minds of Pioneers, May 10, 2000

By 

Jon P. Miller (Foster City, California) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Frontier Illinois (History of the Trans-Appalachian Frontier) (Hardcover)

Read this book when it was first released and have not been able to keep it out of my mind ever since, so I just finished reading it again. As a student of history, my greatest interest is in how the people lived and felt who shaped the events we call history. James F. Davis helped me to visualize how people lived and how they felt about the events they affected and that effected them. Especially impressive is his understanding of the mindsets of Yankees and Southerners and how this evolved as the State matured and grew. I give "Frontier Illinois" my highest unqualified recommendation.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Another readable & scholarly work from a 1st-rate historian, October 24, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Frontier Illinois (History of the Trans-Appalachian Frontier) (Hardcover)

I have just finished James Davis's book of frontier history and felt compelled to not only add my kudos to the growing body of discerning Amazon readers but also to set the record straight. The reader from Springfield, Illinois is clearly mistaken when he accuses Dr. Davis of "poor organization and editing." As pointed out in other reviews, the two figures are not inconsistent; one is national while the other is for Illinois. Davis's editing skills are superlative; that is abundantly apparent when one reads the finely-tuned notes to his DREAMS TO DUST: A DIARY OF THE CALIFORNIA GOLD RUSH 1849-1850 (1989, University of Nebraska Press). Legitimate criticisms are always valid. Unfortunately, the conclusions of the reader from Springfield are neither.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars First class example of well written regional history, September 22, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Frontier Illinois (History of the Trans-Appalachian Frontier) (Hardcover)

Frontier Illinois is a welcome addition to anyone's regional history collection. Dr. Davis has done an admirable job of compiling statistics, anecdotes and insight into a quite readable and understandable work. For those who might consider acquainting themselves with Illinois' place in the development of the frontier, this fits the bill. However, unlike the reader from Springfield, I found no discrepancy between the numbers in dispute on pages 286-287. Clearly, the first listing of mortality(227 deaths) was in reference to the total number for the country from June 1st, 1849 to June 1st of 1850. The second number was listed as `seven murders in Illinois between June 1, 1849 and June 1, 1850'. Any error here is on the part of the reviewer from Springfield.