Alabama and the Borderlands: From Prehistory To Statehood

11 - Michael C. Scardaville - Approaches to the Study of Southeastern Borderlands

11 Approaches to the Study of the Southeastern Borderlands Michael C. Scardaville It is significant, and perhaps not entirely accidental, that this book on Alabama and the Borderlands deals with the least-studied area of all the former Spanish colonies in today's Sunbelt.1 Many of us hope this signals a reawakening of interest in Alabama's Hispanic past, a story still locked up in the archives and still buried below ground.2 It also is appropriate to review the study of the Borderlands, since The University of Alabama Sesquicentennial coincided with the sixtieth anniversary of Herbert E. Bolton's seminal work, appropriately titled The Spanish Borderlands: A Chronicle of Old Florida and the Southwest.3 Bolton, the eminent historian at Berkeley for over thirty years, is considered the father of Borderlands studies.4 Although other late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century historians , such as Bernard Moses and William R. Shepherd, wrote sympathetically about Spanish settlement in the New World, Bolton became the foremost promoter in making North Americans aware of their Hispanic past.5 He established the unofficial School of Borderland Studies and provided the concept, synthesis, and inspiration to generate research in this virgin field. Bolton and his disciples have produced an impressive amount of Borderland scholarship in the last six decades, and, in the process, effectively outlined the major thrust of Spain's role in what is now the United States. What Frederick Jackson Turner had done for the history of the West, 184 THE STUDY OF THE SOUTHEASTERN BORDERLANDS Bolton, a Turner student, did for the Spanish Borderlands, a frontier neglected by the Anglo-oriented Wisconsin historian.6 All of us are indebted to Bolton and his followers for their pioneering studies. Why have the Borderlands been treated as a separate field of historical investigation? What factors have motivated historians over the last sixty years to write about the role of Spain in what is today the United States? I would suggest at least three reasons. First and foremost is that Borderland historians have endeavored to document an unknown side of American history. To date their greatest contribution has been to offer a broader approach to the study of this country's past. Bolton and his successors intended to show that American history did not consist merely of the establishment and expansion of English settlements along the eastern seaboard of North America. Bolton deplored the fact that United States history "is written almost solely from the standpoint of the East and of the English colonies" and that "the importance of the Spanish period in American history has not yet been duly recognized."7 Bolton was concerned that even the French received greater emphasis in American textbooks than the Spanish. He argued that "much more is known, for example, both to scholars and to the general public, of French rather than of Spanish activities in North America, and it is consequently assumed that the French influence was the more important of the two; but the reverse is true ... (France's activities are more known) for the reason that France in America had a Parkman, while Spain in America had none."S Bolton fully intended to correct this imbalance, and to publicize Spain's role in the Borderlands he devoted one-third of his 1920 textbook on the colonization of North America to the period before Jamestown.9 Over the years, influenced by Bolton's missionary zeal, Borderlands historians have diligently attempted to offer a balanced view of Spain's contribution to the exploration and settlement of the continent. The romance and excitement of Borderlands history also have attracted scholars and readers for decades. Historians have documented the exploits of discoverers, conquerors, missionaries, and other "colorful characters,"10 and Bolton himself was captivated by Borderlands history, which he regarded as a "wonderland of romance , filled with figments of imagination" and wondrous stories about the Fountain of Youth, the Chicora Legend, Diamond Mountain , Gran Quivira, and the Seven Cities of Cibola.II Ray Allen Billington, general editor of the Histories of the American Frontier I8S Michael C. Scardaville series, promoted John Francis Bannon's new synthesis on the Spanish Borderlands by describing the area as "rich with color and brimming with excitement (as must be any well-told tale of the conquistadores and mission fathers)."12 And William Coker presented an enticing preview of Borderlands research a decade ago when he discussed the exploits of such...