“Through the grandfather, Steinbeck explores the place and meaning that the nation’s pioneer heritage — the western movement — has for later generations” (Para, 6). What this means is that The idea of westering and the pioneer heritage is something that we can't forget. The westward expansion is what led to America. We bought all this land but people were so scared to move out here. What would things be like now if the first people never traveled out to the west? There would be so much open land that no one lived in and we would all be crammed living on the east