Pierre weekly free press. (Pierre, S.D.) 1889-19??, 1910-09-01


ed. for he was snx>sus to see again
the cattle men with whom he once
lived AS he stepped down to the
ground great shout greeted him
the real yell of the range, uttered by
an escort of 1000 cowboys and cow
girls detailed to act as the ex-presi-
dents bodyguard. That it sounded
good in his ears was made evident by
the happy smile that spread over his
countenance.
Mr.. Roosevelt's visit and the speech
he delivered later in the day formed
the elimination of the annual Frontier
Days celebration which had attracted
to the city thousands of persons from
all parts of the west and a large num-
lions of the country.
Colonel RooseveIt's Speech.
Out in the open air, under the blue
sky, a vast crowd assembled to hear
the former president speak, and it
heard one of the most important
speeches he has made since leaving
the White House. His address was as
follows:
When, at the close of my hunting trip
in Africa, reached the borders of civili-
cation, the first invitation I accepted was
this, to visit the capital of Wyoming on
the day when the people of the frontier
came together to commemorate their
achievements; I glad it was so, be-
cause l have peculiar feeling for the
men and women of what used to be called
the Tar West" and especially for those
tr-r q 1ollyo he, Of
years I lived on ranch on the Little
Missouri, sharing work and play, good
fortune and bad fortune, with my neigh
bors; working on the roundup, serving
as delegate from the Little Missouri
roundup district to the Montana Stock
growers association, and even at times
acting as deputy sheriff at my end of the
county. I count those years as among
the most valuable of my life, because
nothing breeds such community Of feeling
as to work with ones felowmen at their
life tasks, and to learn to know their
feelings by actually sharing them. The
man of the west throughout the success
s1ve stages of western growth, has al
ways been one of the two or three most
typical tigures-indeed I am tempted to
say the most typical fiRure-in American
life, and no man can really understand
our country and appreciate what 1t really
is and what it promises unless he has
the fullest and closest sympathy with the
ideals and aspirations of the west. The
prime reason for this is to be found in
the fact the westerner Is so good an
American. He is an American first and
foremost; for this Is the great lesson,
friends, that all of us need to learn and
to keep, the lesson that it is uninportant
whether man lives north or south, east
or west, provided he is genuinely and in
good faith an American, that he feels
every part of the United States as his
o,,1 hot 1a to 70
uphold the interests of all other Ameri-
cans in whatever sections of the country
they may dwell
hundred years ago, when men spoke
of the west they meant the country be-
tween the Alleghanes and the Mississippi.
Fifty years ago the white mans west
took in Minnesota. Iowa and Kansas, and
then skipped across to California and
Oregon. The country of the great plains
and the Rockies the country In which
you whom I am now addressing lead your
lives and do your work. has grown up
within my own lifetime. I myself saw
and took part in the closing years of the
pioneer period, and 1t was my great priv
ilege to work side by side with the pio-
neers-the ranchmen. the miners, the
cow punchers, the mule-skinners, the bull
whackers-who actually opened up the
country. T have seen the herds and focks
Of the cattlemen and sheepmen supplant
the game; I have seen the fortunate
movement by which the small farm has
tended gradually to take the place of tho
great unfenced ranch. ] now travel in
every comfort on railways across lands
which, when L first rode across them,
were still the home of the Indian and the
buffalo; and I find cities where one can
obtain not merely comfort, but luxury, in
the places where thirty years ago there
was not building beyond a log hut or a
dobie house. The men who did this work
were engaged in the final stages of con-
quering the continent: and it WAS their
privilege to do one of the great works of
all time to do their part in the perform
ance of an epic feat In the history of the
progress Of mankind.
West Stands for Progress.
I have used the word progress. The
west stands for growth, for progress. So
must the whole American people stand.
A great democracy must be progressive
or 1t will soon cease to be either great
or democratic. No nation. no state, no
party. can stand still. 1t must either go
forward or go backward: and 1t becomes
useless If it goes backward. Therefore I
greet you, men Of the west. and I stand
for progress as all men must stand who
are progressive
The pioneers and their immediate suo-
eessors won victory only by proving that
they possessed the great, masterful quail
ties which lie at the foundation of Ma
tional greatness. There are certain we'll
meaning men of intellectual cultivation,
but lacking mental and moral robustness,
who complain continually that they find
American life, and especially the life of
those American communities emerging
from the pioneer stage, crude and with
out genius or beauty. Genius is fine
thing for nation. but character Is a still
finer thing. and though beauty is good.
strength is an even greater good. The
men who have made this great republic
of the west what 1t Is. and especially the
pen who have turned it into continental
commonwealth, have possessed in the
highest degree the great virile virtues of
strength, courage. energy. and undaunted
and unwavering resolution. Their typical
Neaders-of whom Abraham Lincoln,
though most exceptional, was the
most typcal--have possessed keen intel
ligence, and a character not merely
strong but lefty, character exalted by
the fact that great ctsTfer was accom-
panied by high and me determination
to use this great power for the common
good, for the advancement of mankind.
The pioneer days are over. save in few
places: and the more complex life of