Stages of Frontier Development – Oregon

Introduction

The development of the frontiers in Oregon marked a significant period in the United States. It was a period where the colonizers expanded their control in America, which led to the development of disagreements between the European colonizers and the locals. The frontier development in Oregon was marked by three stages.

The initial phase of the frontier was the exploration phase. Here European expeditions explored the regions farther from the frontier. Various expeditions led by different people like Clark and Lewis explored Oregon (Fifer et al., 2001, p. 164). The explorations carried out by the Europeans helped them gauge on how they would interact with the locals who were further inland and the area they would have to cover.

The next stage involved the development of communication between the missionaries and the trappers while getting in touch with the local community. The Europeans hoped to reach out to the local communities in sharing their religion and culture with them. They wanted to engage in commercial ventures with the locals and help in improving the culture of the locals in the process. Most of the Europeans had not the intention of attacking the areas but had stakes involving commerce, cultural and religion. Therefore, they did not plan to attack the locals to gain anything from them.

The third and last stage involved building settlements and forts, which provided protection and enabled more exploration to be carried out. In Oregon, the Europeans set up Fort Astoria, which was used by the Pacific Fur company as an outpost (Bao, 2011, p. 38). The Europeans continued to take over various areas and eventually fought over them with the locals.

The frontier development thus went through the three usual stages that include exploration, building traders and missionary connections, and finally building settlements and forts.

 

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