References intended as fixed categories of frontier masculinity. [1] Dolores Hayden, Building Suburbia: Green Fields Instead, they demonstrate that masculinity was and Urban Growth, 1820­2000 (Knopf: 2003), 21. constantly negotiable at the turn of the nineteenth [2] Gwendolyn Wright, Building the Dream: A Social century. At times, the examples in each archive appear History of Housing America (MIT Press: 1983), 103. paradoxical, which further demonstrates that western [3] Hayden, 78. masculinity defied rigid classifications. Furthermore, the [4] Wright, 100. archive and counter­archive created here are not [5] Hayden, 151. intended to be an exhaustive portrayal of western [6] Hayden, 128. masculinity. Instead, they seek to highlight various [7] Hayden, 147. representations of late­nineteenth and early twentieth­ [8] Hayden, 147. century masculinity, in order to promote dialogue on the subject, not only for scholars, but also for the general public. In order to enhance the legibility and navigability “It is here the romance of my life of this analysis, I have divided the paper into five main began”: The Construction sections: Part I explains the methodology and theory of Frontier Masculinity used throughout this paper along with the selection in Late­Nineteenth­ and Early criteria used to determine the cultural products present Twentieth­Century America in this study. Part II illuminates the historical context surrounding American men’s understanding of their Michael McMenamin masculinity at the turn of the century. Part III introduces Fordham University the three cultural products in my archive, while Part IV presents the three examples in the counter­archive. Part “It is here the romance of my life began,” wrote V articulates the conclusions of this analysis. Theodore Roosevelt in reference to the American West (qtd. in Jenkinson 5)[1]. The West certainly has held a PART I: Methodology special place in American history, especially for men. As My thesis relies on an interdisciplinary approach the nineteenth century transitioned into the twentieth to interpret cultural and historical artifacts. Three century, a variety of historical developments, including disciplines, in particular, influenced my research: “new industrialization, immigration, and the close of the western history,” gender studies, and performance frontier, all contributed to a sense of anxiety felt by many theory. First, new western history emerged in the late white, American men about their manhood. As such, this 1990s and challenged the dominant narrative of white period, specifically 1880 to 1910, serves as a useful men conquering native savages. It investigated the place to investigate frontier masculinity. I argue that a experiences of other westerners, especially women and series of lionized cultural products—including a people of color (Butler and Lansing 7). Similarly, I promotional poster for Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show, a investigate the excluded representations of frontier bronze sculpture by Frederic Remington, and a political masculinity and compare them to dominant portrayals of speech given by Theodore Roosevelt—all conveyed a the ideal westerner. popular portrayal of the ideal, white American Second, I draw on gender studies to examine frontiersman [2]. This ideal representation was defined how men constructed their masculine identities. For the by a man’s horsemanship, his shooting ability, and his context of this work, gender is not an inherent feature of toilsome, yet fulfilling labor. However, other expressions the body (Rico 11). Instead, gender is always of masculinity existed on the frontier. From Theodore constructed (Rico 11). As Judith Butler states, “gender is Roosevelt’s journal recordings, Henry Flipper’s always a doing” (qtd. in Rico 11). Judith Kegan Gardiner accomplishments as a black frontiersman, and Owen believes that the construction of a masculine identity is a Wister’s homoerotic references in The Virginian, I “nostalgic formation, always missing, lost, or about to be construct a counter­archive that challenges the lost, its ideal form located in a past that advances with dominant portrayal of the ideal frontiersman [3]. each generation in order to recede just beyond its grasp” The archive and counter­archive I have (qtd. in Rico 12). Michael Kimmel elaborates on constructed for the purposes of this paper are not Gardiner’s claim, writing, “we tend to search for the M. McMenamin 8 timeless and eternal during moments of crisis, those images,” allowed these men to craft a story of masculine points of transition when the old definitions no longer triumph over nature and Native Americans (Rico 4). work and the new definitions are yet to be firmly The three cultural products that create the first established” (Kimmel 4). The cultural products archive demonstrate the normative and hegemonic investigated in the archive and counter­archive reflect performance of white, frontier masculinity. First, I the efforts of American men to construct their masculine examine Theodore Roosevelt’s speech, “The Strenuous identity, in particular, during a time of social change. Life” (1899). Then, I analyze Frederic Remington’s As a constructed identity, American manhood is sculpture, The Broncho Buster (1895), and finally I influenced by a variety of factors, including race, class, interpret a promotional poster from Buffalo Bill’s Wild ethnicity, age, sexuality, and region of the country West Show (1894). These artifacts portray the dominant (Kimmel 4). As such, many forms of masculinity exist. image of the ideal, white American frontiersman, whose Yet, as Kimmel explains, “all American men must also physicality was defined by his horsemanship, his contend with a singular vision of masculinity, a particular shooting ability, and his toilsome, yet fulfilling labor. In definition that is held up as a model against which we all each case, the artifacts that comprise this archive have measure ourselves” (4). My work demonstrates a been selected because they were culturally pervasive at singular version of frontier masculinity in the archive and their time [5]. then illustrates alternative versions of masculinity in the Roosevelt was a member of the “Eastern counter­archive. Establishment,” which consisted of a series of The single, ideal version of masculinity institutions—the boarding school, the Ivy League described by Kimmel relates to the construction of university, the college club, the metropolitan men’s club, “hegemonic masculinity,” which is at play throughout my and the Social Register (G. White 6). Members of the archive and counter­archive. This form of manhood Eastern Establishment possessed significant cultural often referred to men, typically white, Protestant, and capital and attempted to maintain power, traditions, and wealthy, who “assumed they were entitled to the labor values through these private, elite institutions. Roosevelt and resources of others: women, nonwhites, and wielded this cultural capital. As a result, his extensive working people. Hegemony, moreover, entailed ‘the writings about the West reached a wide audience and ability to impose a particular definition on other kinds of thus informed the American public’s perceptions of the masculinity’” (qtd. in Rico 11). However, “hegemonic region and definitions of manhood. Likewise, his masculinity, like other gender constructions, can never presidency further solidified his pervasiveness as a be completely secure” (Rico 12). The words, images, cultural arbiter. and gestures used to articulate one’s gender are Like Roosevelt, Remington was a member of “always vulnerable to contestation” and can be the Eastern Establishment, and as the nation’s leading constantly “appropriated, reworked, and challenged” illustrator and one of its most popular painters, he (Rico, 12). The constant appropriation of masculinity possessed a significant ability to visually shape constituted a type of performance. perceptions of the West (G. White 7) [6]. In four years, Third, my study relies on performance theory to over four hundred of his illustrations appeared in understand how men enacted their masculinity. The influential magazines such as Harper’s, Outing, and social construction of gender, the insecurity of Century Magazine (Etulain 54). As his work gained masculinity, and the tension between the ideal and non­ attention in various publications, Remington then began ideal forms of manhood all implied the necessity of to win official recognition as a great artist by receiving performance to assert one’s manhood. According to awards and showing his work in various exhibitions (G. Schechner, men could “make belief” through everyday White 101) [7]. The Dial praised Remington as “the performances that “create[d] the social realities they delineator par excellence of the Indian, the cowboy and enact[ed]” (Schechner 35) [4]. For many American men, the greaser” and believed that his illustrations would the West provided a stage on which to assert their influence generations of Americans long after the masculinity and “make belief” in response to a period cowboys of the open West vanished (qtd. in G. White where industrialization, immigration, and other historical 192). As a result of his work and fame, Remington developments challenged their understanding of created a market for his subject matter and “made the themselves. The performance, notably through a “rich careers of half­a­dozen artists who followed him” vocabulary of gestures, objects, sayings, clothing, and (Murdoch 73). In total,