elf-determination was the key characteristic of the economic and
social life of these people.[27]

The pioneer ideal of creative and competitive individualism, which
Turner considered America's best contribution to history and to
progress, was an essential of the frontier experience which became an
integral part of the American mythology.[28] The "myth of the happy
yeoman," as one historian called it, is still revered in American
folklore and respected in American politics, whether it is outmoded or
not.[29] The primitive nature of frontier life developed this
characteristically American trait and the family, the basic
organization of social control, promoted it. It was this promotion, with
its antipathy to any outside control, which stimulated the Revolution,
creating an American nation from an already existing American character.

The individualism of the West Branch frontier is also apparent in the
administration of justice. The Fair Play system emphasized the
personality of law, by its very title, rather than the organized
machinery of justice.[30] Frontier law was personal and direct,
resulting in the unchecked development of the individual, a circumstance
which Turner considered the significant product of this frontier
democracy.[31] Being personal, though, it had meaning for those affected
by it, as an anecdote noted earlier indicated.[32]

Individualism has become somewhat of an anachronism in a mass society,
but its obsolescence today is part of the current American tragedy. The
buoyant self-confidence which it inspired has made much of the American
dream a reality. Legislation, it is true, has taken the place of free
lands as the means of preserving democracy, but it will be a hollow
triumph if that legislation suppresses this essential trait of the
American character, its individualism. No intelligent person today would
recommend a return to the laissez-faire individualism of the Social
Darwinists of the late nineteenth century, but it must be admitted that
a society emphasizing the worth of the individual and dedicated to
principles of justice and fair play, the banner under which the
frontiersmen of the West Branch operated, has genuine merit.

Whether the historian is analyzing old frontiers or charting new ones,
the timeless question remains: does man have the intelligence adequate
to secure his own survival? The old frontiers, such as the Fair Play
territory of the West Branch of the Susquehanna, were