Growing Up with the Country: Childhood on the Far-Western Frontier

Elliott West has written a highly entertaining book packed with historical information about children's development in the American Far West. West chronicles how children had a different perspective about the West than their parents, how children's contributions allowed for the settling of the region, and how children were shaped by the West in ways that their parents, grounded in traditions from Back East or Europe, never achieved. Chapters cover children's "First Impressions", their lives "At Home", "Child's Work" and "Child's Play', "Growing Up", "Family and Community", "A Great School House", "Suffer the Children", and "Children and the Frontier." In each, West gives extensive examples and quotations from primary sources left by children to illustrate his points. In "A Great School House," for example, the author describes the creation of educational facilities in the West to show how hungry western pioneers, both adults and children, were for this formal learning. The conclusion, "Children and the Frontier", summarizes many of West's previous themes and makes broader conclusions about the children's experiences. Unlike parents, sons and daughters were bred for western conditions, whether raising livestock, planting crops, or prospecting for minerals. Their lives reflect the influence of the West on the new generation, as well as showing how the older influences of American life (home, culture, music, education, games) endured. All in all, I would heartily recommend the book to anyone interested in the western frontier experience, as an antidote to the men-laden images of many western accounts.