Highlights Archives
Frederick Jackson Turner's Personal Library
"Up to our own day American history has been in a large degree the history of the colonization of the Great West. The existence of an area of free land, its continuous recession, and the advance of American settlement westward, explain American development. ... And now, four centuries from the discovery of America, at the end of a hundred years of life under the Constitution, the frontier has gone, and with its going has closed the first period of American history."
— An excerpt from Frederick Jackson Turner's "The Significance of the Frontier in American History"
With these words, Wisconsin-born historian Frederick Jackson Turner made perhaps the single most significant interpretation of the American past, laying the foundation for the study of the American West for generations. Now, Turner's personal library, approximately 215 volumes, as well as some books from the library of his grandson, noted Revolutionary War historian Jackson Turner Main, has been donated to the Society.
Turner was born in Portage, Wisconsin, on November 14, 1861, the oldest of three children. His father, a journalist and amateur local historian, inspired Turner's interest in history and he published his first piece of historical research in his local paper in 1883. Turner went on to receive his master's in history from the University of Wisconsin and a doctorate from Johns Hopkins University in 1890. Turner then returned to Wisconsin to assume an assistant professorship in history in 1889.
Only four years later, in 1893, Turner delivered his most famous work, "The Significance of the Frontier in American History," at a meeting of the American Historical Association held at the Chicago World's Fair. In his speech, Turner argued that the distinctive history of the United States was best explained by its frontier past. The frontier not only helped to shape the character of American institutions, but also the characteristics of the American people themselves, Turner argued. Although the work was almost totally ignored at the time, Turner's pronouncement eventually gained widespread distribution and has been hailed as "the single most influential piece of writing in the history of American history."
Turner left Wisconsin for Harvard in 1910, where he taught until his retirement in 1924. He returned to Madison for a time before moving to Pasadena, California, to serve as research director of the Huntington Library until his death in 1932. After his death, Turner's wife Caroline moved back to Madison and brought Turner's books with her. Turner's daughter Dorothy eventually inherited the library, which she passed on to her son, Jackson Turner Main. Main, the author of seven books exploring the social bases of political behavior in Revolutionary America, died in 2003. Main's widow Gloria Main donated the books to the Society at the end of October, on the condition that they are maintained as a collection.
The library is essentially as Turner left it, and the books include a number of letters, notes, postcards and photographs tucked between the pages. Most of the books have Turner's signature or stamp inside, and many of the books are inscribed to Turner by the author. Not surprisingly, many of the books are on American history, though books of poetry and nature are also included. Turner's library provides insight into the interests and associates of an important figure in both Wisconsin and American history, and is a significant addition to the Society's collections.
Learn more about Frederick Jackson Turner in the Wisconsin Historical Society Press book, Frederick Jackson Turner: Wisconsin's Historian of the Frontier.
:: Posted November 13, 2006
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