Frontier Space
Project Bibliography & Binder Prints
“Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past.” - George Orwell
Project Summary
The Present
To demonstrate how modern fault lines of micro-culture and economy Mr. Garreau and his co-horts of researchers trace fall neatly along the lines of the major blocs of Native American powers that fell before them.
The Past
Above the Rio Grande
South of the Border
South America and the Spanish is another story. The South American continent seems to have a more brutal character than the North American continent from the past right up to today, for whatever reason. The brutality of the Conquistador’s is legend horrifying. Such as testing the sharpness of their steel blades by catching hold of an enslaved natives arm and lopping it off at the elbow. The Aztecs and cultures of human sacrifice. The Spanish. The brutality Potosi silver mines. In the modern context there are Columbian neckties and the 80s violences of the coups and cartels.
Futures?
To the South
Based on historical precedent, it’s not a bad bet that American law enforcement or military may be obliged to enter Mexican territory if the cartels cannot be brought to heel by Mexican authorities. A bleak bet, but nonetheless. That is, after all, what brought the military and the law west after the settlers sparked violence by illegally occupying native territory and consuming their resources.
To the North
The suggestion of Canadian and North American integration - that is simply bringing the Canadian states that exist today into the federated union of American states - seems to trigger ideas of military conquest or other such misunderstanding. But from a perspective of cultural relevance and mutual benefit to extend the rights of citizenship and economic integration are self-evident. The reason Trump’s proposed tariffs on Canada seem so ridiculous is because the American and Canadian economies are already holistically integrated. Money, capital, goods and services move freely across the border. Citizens are the only ones getting the short end of the stick. Their rights stop short one way or the other at an arbitrary line across the face of the continent while the fruits of their labor go forth and prosper.
Two Sides
Texas, The United States & Mexico
In August, 1854, the warriors passed that massive range of the Sierra Madre, which would seem to be an insurmountable wall of defense, and the towns of San Pedro de Iturbide, Galeana, Doctor Arroyo and Rio Blanco suddenly beheld the tomahawk of the savages hurled at the heads of their inmates. A hundred and ten Comanches, in a single body, attacked those settlements, as recorded in the following communique:
100 savages have invaded this city, committing acts of cruelty at the Penuelo, where they murdered all 200 inhabitants, consisting of women and children, while the men were out tending cattle. The city thirsts for vengeance. Sends guns and ammunition at once. - Pedro Pereyra.
Official reports of the committee of investigation sent in 1873 by the Mexican government to the frontier of Texas.
If the Committee’s report is to be believed, and there is no reason to doubt its thoroughness, 1800s Texas was a clearing house for organized crime. A cattle and equestrian mafia. Cattle rings and thieves who ran horses and cattle across the Rio Grande at scale - stealing them south and selling them north to be sold and or processed in Kansas, Colorado, Missouri and other points east. They also paid natives for their services as raiders, putting them up to it. (The 1873 report was commissioned in response to Texas accusing Mexicans of stealing their horse and cattle.)
Bands of Americans, Texans, Mexicans and Indians exhausted the wealth of that region… The only emigrants to that part of Texas were not noted for rectitude or sobriety. It was the refuge of criminals fleeing justice in Mexico; adventurers from the United States seeking criminal fortune, and vagrants hoping, in the shadow of disorganization and lawlessness, to escape punishment for their crimes. - Official reports by committee. pg. 12
I mention this because one commonly encounters in the history of the Apache, Comanche, Sioux, or Navajo a depiction of the natives role as raiders. To be fair, the historians do give credit to the settlers for pushing natives to raiding by taking their best lands, animals, and so on - leaving them no means of subsistence by consuming what was theirs. However, one rarely hears that just as true anyone Anglo, Mexican in Arizona, New Mexico or Texas was into running guns, slaves, stolen horses or cattle albeit petty or wholesale.
A band of nine thieves operated in United States territory. In April, 1865, they went to Burgos, forty miles south of Rio Bravo, and assaulted two Garzas, robbing them of $2,000, murdering one, then fled back north. - Official reports by committee. pg. 21
The Committee lays out a bustling black stock market economy, as characterized the buyers of the stolen animals as one of three types. (23)
Persons who dwell in Texas and buy animals at unscrupulously low (obviously stolen) prices. Buyers.
Persons who well in Texas who collect the horses from the thieves returning from Mexico at the river shore. Middlemen.
Persons who dwell in Texas, and employ gangs of thieves, organizing thieving operations into Mexico. Headmen.
The committee goes identifies judges and officer of the law as key persons involved in the cattle mafia.
Related: A look at the business of war in Arizona and New Mexico territory
“You’re an hombre that figures he’s right smart, an’ you might be if you didn’t figure the other fellow was so all-fired dumb.
A man like you ain’t got a chance to win for long in any game for that reason. You take everybody for bein’ loco or dumb as a month-old calf. You ride into everything full of confidence and’ sneers. You’re like most crooks. You think everything will turn out right for you.
You came into this country big an’ strong. You saw Reynolds and Pogue, an’ you figured them for easy marks. You have something on the Vernons, I have figured that out yet. But you overlooked the obvious.” - The Rider of Ruby Hills. Louis L’Amour. pg. 67
Covers
This project is intended to print out in three-ring binder format. This post contains the binder covers and project references as bibliography. (Individual posts list specific references.)
My journey nears its end. These projects are complete. May peace & justice be with you always and may you always feel free.
Binder Prints
Complete Project References
Hyde, George E. A Sioux Chronicle. Norman, University Of Oklahoma Press, 1956.
Lancaster, Richard. Piegan. 1966.
Gwynne, S. C. (2010). Empire of the Summer Moon: Quanah Parker and the rise and fall of the Comanches, the most powerful Indian tribe in American history.
Cornelius C. Smith, Jr. Fort HuaChuca The story of a frontier post.
Thrapp, D. L. (1975). The conquest of Apacheria. University of Oklahoma Press.
Worcester, D. E. (1979). The Apaches Eagles of the Southwest. University of Oklahoma Press.
Melody, M. E. (1989). The Apaches. Chelsea House Publishers.
Lund, Duane R. The Indian Wars. Cambridge, Minn., Adventure Publications, 1995.
White, Lonnie J. Hostiles and Horse Soldiers. 1972.
Richardson, Rupert Norval. Comanche Barrier to South Plains Settlement. 1 Mar. 1993.
Official reports of the committee of investigation sent in 1873 by the Mexican government to the frontier of Texas. 1873.
Eno, Arthur L. Cotton Was King. 3rd ed., New Hampshire Publishing Company, 1976.
Garreau, Joel. The Nine Nations of North America. 1st ed., Avon Books, 1981.
Struggle for a Continent. The French and Indian Wars 1689-1763. Harper Collins. 2000.
Utley, Robert M, and Wilcomb E Washburn. Indian Wars. Boston Mass., Houghton Mifflin, 2002.
Osborn, William M. The Wild Frontier. Random House, 18 Nov. 2009.
Vestal, Stanley. Warpath. U of Nebraska Press.
Sides, Hampton. Blood and Thunder. Anchor, 9 Oct. 2007.
Carlos, Ann M, et al. Commerce by a Frozen Sea : Native Americans and the European Fur Trade. Philadelphia, University Of Pennsylvania Press, 2010.
Hoxie, Frederick E. Encyclopedia of North American Indians. Boston, Houghton Mifflin Co, 1996.
Dick, Everett Newton. Conquering the Great American Desert. 1975.
Monnett, John H. The Battle of Beecher Island and the Indian War of 1867-1869. 1 May 1994.
Mcdermott, John. Circle of Fire. S.L., Stackpole Books, 2020.
McGinnis, Anthony. Counting Coup and Cutting Horses. Johnson Books, 1990.
Mangum, Neil C. Battle of the Rosebud. Upton & Sons, 1987.
Greene, Jerome A. Morning Star Dawn: The Powder River Expedition and the Northern Cheyennes, 1876. Norman, University Of Oklahoma Press, 2003.
Very nice !