The story of America’s public lands is essentially the history of the nation. It is a story of victories and defeats, of hopes and disappointments, of justice and injustices, of men and women looking for better lives, of men and women fighting to keep the lives they have known. It is a story written in blood, sweat, and tears, on landscapes of indescribable beauty and richness.
They came across the ocean, Spanish, French and English, to the shores of a world they called "new” because they thought they had discovered it. They came from the south and from the east; they were Catholics and Protestants. In the old world that they left behind, they were enemies, and they brought their hostilities with them. Yet, in spite of their differences, they were cut from the same cloth: they were inheritors of the knowledge gained by long-gone civilizations. Molded in the forges of clashing empires; tempered by long wars, pestilences, and hunger, they emerged from the dark centuries of the Middle Ages into the bright dawn of the Enlightenment and stood in the world's door which was open to them. They possessed an arrogance, a belief in their superiority, and a belief in the might of their God who recognized no others.
And when they arrived at the shores of the world so new to them, they claimed its lands for their kings and waged war on all who rose to challenge their rights to do so.
Seven of the original thirteen colonies along the eastern seaboard held claim to the lands between the Appalachians and the Mississippi River. For six (Massachusetts, Connecticut, Vermont, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia) these claims were based on early colonial charters from England while the seventh, New York, based its claim on concessions received from the Iroquois Indians. The remaining states had no claim to Trans Appalachia. Following the War of Independence, Maryland raised the issue of what should become of the territory beyond the mountains by declaring:
The back lands claimed by the British Crown, if secured by the blood and treasure of all, ought in reason, justice, and policy . . . be considered as a common stock.
-- State of Maryland
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| Spanish Colonies, early 1600s |
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