The aegis & intelligencer. [volume] (Bel Air, Md.) 1864-1923, 1885-11-06
MisIel
The Harmony Community OF Economy,
Pa

Eighteen miles below Pittsburgh, on a
bluff overlooking the beautiful valley of Ohio,
lies the little German village bearing the
quaint name of Economy, whose inhabitants
| are known for miles around is "the Econo-
mites" Below the bluff, on either side of
the river, runs busy railroad; steamboats,
plying between Pittsburgh and the lower
ports of the Ohio and Kanawha pass and re-
pass almost continually, and when the hearts
of the rivermen are gaddened by u "coal.
boat rise, tiotilas of barges, laden with the
mineral wealth of western Pennsylvania,
| throng the broad river highway.
| Besides this busting scene the little village
stands like the fragment OF a past century,
| sandwiched by some strange anachronism
| into the present, and no great exercise ofthe
Imagination would be required of casual
visitor to produce upon him the impression
that this is one of the very villages of the
Nieuw Netherlands so graphically described
| by Diedrich Knickerbocker in his veracious
history. Here, empowered amid fruit trees,
are the houses with their gables to the street,
and only TO be entered at the gate; some of
| them, moreover, having the date of their
erection curiously wrought into the brick
work or carved on the Intel, precisely as in
New Amsterdam. Sundry weather-cocks,
ferent ways that every man can have wind
to his mind" Here and there on the streets
old men with broad -brimmed black hats move
leisurely along, clad otherwise all in blue
broadcloth, or, even, if it happens to be a
holiday, in blue silk or it may be some aged
dame whose silver hair peeps out from be-
meath bright blue silken Normandy cap
By one of the curious ironies of fate, the re-
ceding tide of civil war in 1866 left in this
peaceful village of non-combatants an Old
cannon, which, mounted in commanding
position, as if TO sweep the river, and on
summer evenings surrounded by group of
merry children, adds much to the pictur-
sequences of the surroundings.
The community, which owns the village
and the adjoining farms, comprising some
what more than $500 acres, included at one
time nearly thousand persons, but the num-
Der has now dwindled to less than fifty, most
of whom are drawing near to or have passed
the allotted term ofthree-score years and ten.
Silent mills and factories attest the former
activity of the community. Old citizens re-
member the Economy broadcloths, flannels,
blankets and the famous Economy whisky,
which was held in such high repute that it is
still called for occasionally, for the use of in
valids, though none is now to be had, as the
stills were torn down more than twenty
years ago. Here silk culture and manufac-
ture were first established on a business scale
in the United States, but were abandoned as
Improbable, though fabrics ofadmirable tex
ture and design were made, and the members
still wear garments of silk produced on their
own soil and woven with their own hands
Here the student of social science may
trace the practical working of the idea that
has glittered before the minds of great and
good men and visionary dreamers, almost
since the world began-community of labor,
of goods and of interests, sustained by
brotherly love. Nor can it it be denied thai,
measured by the material standard, the eX.
pertinent at Economy has been a successful
one. Driven from Germany by religious per-
solutions, the society settled in America in
1906, and, after various wanderngs, cleared
away the forests and founded their present
village in 1925, their aim being to return to
the model OF the earliest Christian commune
ties, as portrayed in the writings of the
Apostles. At first the members married and
kept up the individual family relation, but
becoming convinced aftera time that celbacy
would be more in conformity with the teach
ings of Christ and His early disciples, they
voluntarily adopted the latter mode of life,
from which period their number has gradually
diminished until only the present handful re-
mains. Industry, sefdenial, scrupuous
honesty and division of labor soon placed
them in possession of a fund which, by prud-
ent investment, increased far beyond their
immediate needs, and which, notwithstand-
ing that they have produced but little for some
years past, is still reckoned by millions
though the members of the society deprecate
as exaggerations the usual estimates that are
made of their wealth.
| In the days of sperm and lard oil and tai
| Low inc Mi Nc
| land in q remote corner of Pennsylvania,
| with the design of obtaining the timber with
which it was covered When the discovery
of petroleum threw all Pennsylvania into a
fever of speculation, this tract proved to be
part of the most richly productive oil terri
| tory, and source of great wealth to the
society. A few years ago they invested a
sum in railroad shares, and amid the general
wreckiug of railroads that has since ensued,
their road has continued to thrive, yielding
them not only handsome return in divi-
dends, but enabling them to sell out their in
terest at the proper time at a large advance
upon the origina. investment. Within few
months the discovery and the utilization of
natural gas have laid the foundations Of new
fortunes in Pennsylvania, and the develop.
ment of tile gas bearing territory has stead.
ly crept towards Economy, until to day,
standing in the streets of the quiet village,
one hears the roar of the latest monster gas
well, only four miles away, and rumors are
circulating daily that the Economics" are
getting ready to drill their lands for gas. Is
| 1t to be wondered at that neighbors nod their
heads wisely and say, 1T will be Just the
Economics luck to strike a greater well
than any one has yet found"? Is it strange
that the members of the community devoutly
believe that Providence has watched over
and prospered their undertaking?
| MANI ,,rnhan nhil1 ,a,, ha,,a l,ao,, raa,,,l