The fundamental ideas upon which all recent careful work in western history has been based were first stated by Frederick J. Turner, in his paper on The Significance of the Frontier in American History, in the Annual Report of the Am. Hist. Assn., 1893. No comprehensive history of the trans-Mississippi West has yet appeared; Randall Parrish, The Great Plains (2d ed., Chicago, 1907), is at best only a brief and superficial sketch; the histories of the several far western states by Hubert Howe Bancroft remain the most useful collection of secondary materials upon the subject. R.G. Thwaites, Rocky Mountain Exploration (N.Y., 1904); O.P. Austin, Steps in the Expansion of our Territory (N.Y., 1903); H. Gannett, Boundaries of the United States and of the Several States and Territories (Bulletin of the U.S. Geological Survey, No. 226, 1904); and Organic Acts for the Territories of the United States with Notes thereon (56th Cong., 1st sess., Sen. Doc. 148), are also of use.

The local history of the West must yet be collected from many varieties of sources. The state historical societies have been active for many years, their more important collections comprising: Publications of the Arkansas Hist. Assn., Annals of Iowa, Iowa Hist. Record, Iowa Journal of Hist. and Politics, Collections of the Minnesota Hist. Soc., Trans. of the Kansas State Hist. Soc., Trans. and Rep. of the Nebraska Hist. Soc., Proceedings of the Missouri Hist. Soc., Contrib. to the Hist. Soc. of Montana, Quart. of the Oregon Hist. Soc., Quart. of the Texas State Hist. Assn., Collections of the Wisconsin State Hist. Soc. The scattered but valuable fragments to be found in these files are to be supplemented by the narratives contained in the histories of the single states or sections, the more important of these being: T.H. Hittell, California; F. Hall, Colorado; J.C. Smiley, Denver (an unusually accurate and full piece of local history); W. Upham, Minnesota in Three Centuries; G.P. Garrison, Texas; E.H. Meany, Washington; J. Schafer, Hist. of the Pacific Northwest; R.G. Thwaites, Wisconsin, and the Works of H.H. Bancroft.

The comprehensive collection of geographic data for the West is the Reports of Explorations and Surveys for a Railroad from the Mississippi River to the Pacific Ocean, made by the War Department and published by Congress in twelve huge volumes, 1855–. The most important official predecessors of this survey left the following reports: E. James, Account of an Expedition from Pittsburg to the Rocky Mountains, performed in the Years 1819, 1820, ... under the Command of Maj. S.H. Long (Phila., 1823); J.C. FrÉmont, Report of the Exploring Expeditions to the Rocky Mountains in the Year 1842, and to Oregon and North California in the Years 1843–'44 (28th Cong., 2d sess., Sen. Doc. 174); W.H. Emory, Notes of a Military Reconnoissance from Ft. Leavenworth ... to San Diego ... (30th Cong., 1st sess., Ex. Doc. 41); H. Stansbury, Exploration and Survey of the Valley of the Great Salt Lake of Utah ... (32d Cong., 1st sess., Sen. Ex. Doc. 3). From the great number of personal narratives of western trips, those of James O. Pattie, John B. Wyeth, John K. Townsend, and Joel Palmer may be selected as typical and useful. All of these, as well as the James narrative of the Long expedition, are reprinted in the monumental R.G. Thwaites, Early Western Travels, which does not, however, give any aid for the period after 1850. Later travels of importance are J.I. Thornton, Oregon and California in 1848 ... (N.Y., 1849); Horace Greeley, An Overland Journey from New York to San Francisco in the Summer of 1859 (N.Y., 1860); R.F. Burton, The City of the Saints, and across the Rocky Mountains to California (N.Y., 1862); R.B. Marcy, The Prairie Traveller, a Handbook for Overland Expeditions (edited by R.F. Burton, London, 1863); F.C. Young, Across the Plains in '65 (Denver, 1905); Samuel Bowles, Across the Continent (Springfield, 1861); Samuel Bowles, Our New West, Records of Travels between the Mississippi River and the Pacific Ocean (Hartford, 1869); W.A. Bell, New Tracks in North America (2d ed., London, 1870); J.H. Beadle, The Undeveloped West, or Five Years in the Territories (Phila., 1873).

The classic account of traffic on the plains is Josiah Gregg, Commerce of the Prairies, or the Journal of a Santa FÉ Trader (many editions, and reprinted in Thwaites); H.M. Chittenden, History of Steamboat Navigation on the Missouri River (N.Y., 1903), and The American Fur Trade of the Far West (N.Y., 1902), are the best modern accounts. A brilliant sketch is C.F. Lummis, Pioneer Transportation in America, Its Curiosities and Romance (McClure's Magazine, 1905). Other works of use are Henry Inman, The Old Santa FÉ Trail (N.Y., 1898); Henry Inman and William F. Cody, The Great Salt Lake Trail (N.Y., 1898); F.A. Root and W.E. Connelley, The Overland Stage to California (Topeka, 1901); F.G. Young, The Oregon Trail, in Oregon Hist. Soc. Quarterly, Vol. I; F. Parkman, The Oregon Trail.

Railway transportation in the Far West yet awaits its historian. Some useful antiquarian data are to be found in C.F. Carter, When Railroads were New (N.Y., 1909), and there are a few histories of single roads, the most valuable being J.P. Davis, The Union Pacific Railway (Chicago, 1894), and E.V. Smalley, History of the Northern Pacific Railroad (N.Y., 1883). L.H. Haney, A Congressional History of Railways in the United States to 1850; J.B. Sanborn, Congressional Grants of Lands in Aid of Railways, and B.H. Meyer, The Northern Securities Case, all in the Bulletins of the University of Wisconsin, contain much information and useful bibliographies. The local historical societies have published many brief articles on single lines. There is a bibliography of the continental railways in F.L. Paxson, The Pacific Railroads and the Disappearance of the Frontier in America, in Ann. Rep. of the Am. Hist. Assn., 1907. Their social and political aspects may be traced in J.B. Crawford, The CrÉdit Mobilier of America (Boston, 1880) and E.W. Martin, History of the Granger Movement (1874). The sources, which are as yet uncollected, are largely in the government documents and the files of the economic and railroad periodicals.

For half a century, during which the Indian problem reached and passed its most difficult places, the United States was negligent in publishing compilations of Indian laws and treaties. In 1837 the Commissioner of Indian Affairs published in Washington, Treaties between the United States of America and the Several Indian Tribes, from 1778 to 1837: with a copious Table of Contents. After this date, documents and correspondence were to be found only in the intricate sessional papers and the Annual Reports of the Commissioner of Indian Affairs, which accompanied the reports of the Secretary of War, 1832–1849, and those of the Secretary of the Interior after 1849. In 1902 Congress published C.J. Kappler, Indian Affairs, Laws, and Treaties (57th Cong., 1st sess., Sen. Doc. 452). Few historians have made serious use of these compilations or reports. Two other government documents of great value in the history of Indian negotiations are, Thomas Donaldson, The Public Domain (47th Cong., 2d sess., H. Misc. Doc. 45, Pt. 4), and C.C. Royce, Indian Land Cessions in the United States (with many charts, in 18th Ann. Rep. of the Bureau of Am. Ethnology, Pt. 2, 1896–1897). Most special works on the Indians are partisan, spectacular, or ill informed; occasionally they have all these qualities. A few of the most accessible are: A.H. Abel, History of the Events resulting in Indian Consolidation West of the Mississippi (in Ann. Rep. of the Am. Hist. Assn., 1906, an elaborate and scholarly work); J.P. Dunn, Massacres of the Mountains, a History of the Indian Wars of the Far West (N.Y., 1886; a relatively critical work, with some bibliography); R.I. Dodge, Our Wild Indians ... (Hartford, 1883); G.E. Edwards, The Red Man and the White Man in North America from its Discovery to the Present Time (Boston, 1882; a series of Lowell Institute lectures, by no means so valuable as the pretentious title would indicate); I.V.D. Heard, History of the Sioux War and Massacres of 1862 and 1863 (N.Y., 1863; a contemporary and useful narrative); O.O. Howard, Nez Perce Joseph, an Account of his Ancestors, his Lands, his Confederates, his Enemies, his Murders, his War, his Pursuit and Capture (Boston, 1881; this is General Howard's personal vindication); Mrs. Helen Hunt Jackson, A Century of Dishonor, a Sketch of the United States Government's Dealings with Some of the Indian Tribes (N.Y., 1881; highly colored and partisan); G.W. Manypenny, Our Indian Wards (Cincinnati, 1880; by a former Indian Commissioner); L.E. Textor, Official Relations between the United States and the Sioux Indians (Palo Alto, 1896; one of the few scholarly and dispassionate works on the Indians); F.A. Walker, The Indian Question (Boston, 1874; three essays by a former Indian Commissioner); C.T. Brady, Indian Fights and Fighters and Northwestern Fights and Fighters (N.Y., 1907; two volumes in his series of American Fights and Fighters, prepared for consumers of popular sensational literature, but containing much valuable detail, and some critical judgments).

Nearly every incident in the history of Indian relations has been made the subject of investigations by the War and Interior departments. The resulting collections of papers are to be found in the congressional documents, through the indexes. They are too numerous to be listed here. The searcher should look for reports from the Secretary of War, the Secretary of the Interior, or the Postmaster-general, for court-martial proceedings, and for reports of special committees of Congress. Dunn gives some classified lists in his Massacres of the Mountains.

There is a rapidly increasing mass of individual biography and reminiscence for the West during this period. Some works of this class which have been found useful here are: W.M. Meigs, Thomas Hart Benton (Phila., 1904); C.W. Upham, Life, Explorations, and Public Services of John Charles FrÉmont (40th thousand, Boston, 1856); S.B. Harding, Life of George B. Smith, Founder of Sedalia, Missouri (Sedalia, 1907); P.H. Burnett, Recollections and Opinions of an Old Pioneer (N.Y., 1880; by one who had followed the Oregon trail and had later become governor of California); A. Johnson, S.A. Douglas (N.Y., 1908; one of the most significant biographies of recent years); H. Stevens, Life of Isaac Ingalls Stevens (Boston, 1900); R.S. Thorndike, The Sherman Letters (N.Y., 1894; full of references to frontier conditions in the sixties); P.H. Sheridan, Personal Memoirs (London, 1888; with a good map of the Indian war of 1867–1868, which the later edition has dropped); E.P. Oberholtzer, Jay Cooke, Financier of the Civil War (Phila., 1907; with details of Northern Pacific railway finance); H. Villard, Memoirs (Boston, 1904; the life of an active railway financier); Alexander Majors, Seventy Years on the Frontier (N.Y., 1893; the reminiscences of one who had belonged to the great firm of Russell, Majors, and Waddell); G.R. Brown, Reminiscences of William M. Stewart of Nevada (1908).

Miscellaneous works indicating various types of materials which have been drawn upon are: O.J. Hollister, The Mines of Colorado (Springfield, 1867; a miners' handbook); S. Mowry, Arizona and Sonora (3d ed., 1864; written in the spirit of a mining prospectus); T.B.H. Stenhouse, The Rocky Mountain Saints (London, 1874; a credible account from a Mormon missionary who had recanted without bitterness); W.A. Linn, The Story of the Mormons (N.Y., 1902; the only critical history of the Mormons, but having a strong Gentile bias); T.J. Dimsdale, The Vigilantes of Montana, or Popular Justice in the Rocky Mountains (2d ed., Virginia City, 1882; a good description of the social order of the mining camp).