Arizona weekly journal-miner., 1899-12-13
MOVING WESTWARD
As . Locality ~West- Travets Eaeh Year Farth~F Towards she
 Settfsg san-

The query. Where Is the west 9''- the wes, as locality and not as p0iat of the compsss-has, for several req sons. acquired a new interest in recent times. In the political EOEnsnelsts are of the latter part of the da-s when slavery was in existence Kentack Tennessee and Missouri were classed with the south. although in the earlier times all three of these states were considered, and rightly so. part of the west lt was as western states that Kentucky and Tennessee. under spes = CT Clay, of the former state. turned the scale in favor of war against England iE 1872. and eoercsd the peace-loving Madison. against the counsel of the other man of peace. Jefferson. into the adoption of a var policy. It was Rs Q western state that the northern mem bers of congress ia isIe-'2o sought to shut slavery out of Missouri
 Geographically speaking. it was in 1Tss that the west began tc have a local habifation and a name. That was the year in which the colony of Manasseh Cutler, Samuel Parsons and Rufus Put nam laid the foundations of Ohio. The pioneers of Kentucky and Tennessee had planted settlements in their local ities earlier than this. but Kentucky was then regarded merely sS an exten- sion of Virginia, and Tennessee Rn elongStion of North Carolina. Ohio, on the other hand. as well as fhe rest Of the states of the old northwest territory, were considered from the 0utnet 10 be embryo commonwealth. It was ar ranged from the beginning of their ex- istenee that these were 10 be separate states, which were to have all the pow CTS and 10 be subject to ali the Ohliga- tions of the original iS members of the national Sisterhood. As. concrete geographical fact the west as a locality had its beginning on that April day In I7ss wbsn Putnam's and Parsons Nay flower, with its load of pioneers from New England. sailed down the Ohio and planted their settlement at the mouth of the Muskingum.
 As a geographical mark she west was q continually receding line from the beginning of the government on- ward until few years ago, when the Pacific slope started to become widely settled. \ hundred years ago ~out West" meant anywhere from Rochester or Buffalo south 10 Gordonville, Va. or Greensborough. \. C. The line moved slowly for the next few years. but after the introduction of steamboats on the rivers west of the Alleghenies and the advance of the verge of the settled area 10 the prairie country the march per ceptibly quickened. When Daniel Boone died i9 1920 the western verge of the settled area of the United States had reached him in Missouri. Kit Car son saw it cross the Rocky mountains, and ten years ago, wheL the state of Washington was admitted, the westerly line occupied the Pacific shore from the Mexican boundary to Canada The old elassifcations of the states has become obsolete.
 The Mississippi aud not the Ale ghenies should be considered the divid- ing line between the east and the west. While the population center has not yet reached the Mississippi. the geograph- ically center, exclusive of Alaska and the recent acquisitions of territory. is in Smith county. Kan. As Pike's so- called American Sahara, which is in reality among the most fertile regions of the country, fills up with inhabitants the population center will approach its geographical center and render a change in the old political classification of the states even more necessary than it is now. Historically, socially, geo graphically, and politically the west is an exceedingly interesting part of the country, but it becomes constantly more and more difficult to answer the question: Where is the west2"-St. Louis Globe-Democrat.