And I talked with my great grandmother about her family providing meals to visiting tribes on their farm in Iowa, and how there was some sort of marker indicating that they were a welcoming farm for traveling tribes. The majority of people in the frontier were northerners/immigrants looking to create a better life, not ex-Confederates looking to take out their being complete losers on the frontier. These were people often rejected by their own society for having the wrong religion (my family were German/Irish Catholics who were literally driven out, the Irish part arriving as orphans because their families died on the boats over), living in very rugged/primitive situations, dependant entirely on their individual ability to survive. There was very much an individualism yet a 'look out for others' ethic among these people whom had had no one look out for them (to the point their home countries had left them to die) and a very strong appreciation of America having providing them a place where they could go.