American Nations: A History of the Eleven Rival Regional Cultures of North America

The Far West was the last area in the US to be colonized, as it is inhospitable to Western forms of agriculture. It receives little rainfall, and some of the region is at high elevations. In addition, many of the region’s rivers are too shallow for navigation. The extreme nature of its conditions made it impossible for groups such as the Yankees, Midlanders, and Appalachians to settle. Most of the settlers came instead through a connection to the nation’s industrial corporations. Unique in North America, the Far West is not defined by a regional culture but by external institutions. Its environment required the intervention of inventions such as hard rock mines, barbed wire, hydroelectric dams, railroads, and telegraphs. Therefore, the Far West is a colony of the continent’s older nations and the federal government.

The first settlers in the region were the Yankee Mormons of Utah, who followed a utopian movement with roots in Vermont and upstate New York’s burned-over district. Mormons were almost entirely from Yankeedom, explaining why Utah had the highest percentage of English Americans of any state in 2000. While different in several ways from Yankees, the Mormons share their emphasis on communitarianism, good works, morality, assimilation of others, and utopianism.