Crevecoeur's vision of America

“Here on the contrary, everything is modern”. “Here he beholds fair cities, substantial villages, extensive fields, an immense country filled with decent houses, good roads, orchards, meadows, and bridges, where a hundred years ago, all was wild, woody and uncultivated! What a train of pleasing ideas this fair spectacle must suggest”

The above quotes are from Crevecoeur’s Letters from an American Farmer which show that he believes that America is at the forefront of development, and that Europeans coming to America would be amazed at how developed the country is.

http://www.150.si.edu/150trav/remember/amerinv.htm

The above webpage shows a selection of American inventors and inventions. This webpage shows us that Americans have created many items which are now part of our everyday life. The fact that the inventors of the items featured on the webpage saw a problem in life, and chose to devote their time to solve it, mirrors Crevecoeur’s vision of America, where the settlers saw a country with areas which were” wild, woody and uncultivated” and managed to put the effort in to turn those areas of land into sprawling cities fit for people to inhabit.

On the webpage I posted, it shows the artificial heart which was created by an American. The artificial heart was a scientific breakthrough as before it was created people would have thought it was impossible, yet now it is treated as a common medical tool. This sense of achieving the possible is referred to in the above quote from Crevecoeur, in which he mentions that Europeans coming to America would be amazed at how much progress the settlers had made in developing the country, such as creating cities and roads, in just a short space of time. This is important, as in the over populated cities in Europe at that time the idea of travelling to a distant unknown country, walking into the wilderness and creating your home there would be impossible, yet the settlers in America achieved it. This vision of America as being “modern” and not backing away from a challenge has been valid all the way through the history of America, and is still valid present day, through examples such as inventions created by people with a dream who chose to make it a reality.