The daily morning journal and courier., 1901-12-23
THE ONEIDA COMMUNITY.
ITS SOCIAL EXPERIMENT 4B4N-
 DONLD
And It's Estate Now Valued at Over Il
 Million Dollars.

foundation for the Oneida Community on the banks of historic Oneida Creek
 in 1S4S, he builded better than he knew,
 never dreaming that long after the pe-
 culiar social features which gave birth to it had been wiped off the slate of
 time the descendants of his loyal band
 of followers would cut wide swath i'll
 the commercial world and the products
 of their skill and industry would be known wherever the sun shines.
 Over twenty years ago the communi-
 ty abandoned the unique social eXperl-
 ment which it had tried for so long a
 time in the face of bitter public senti- ment, and by unanimous consent it's members returned to the ordinary
 forms of society. The members inter-
 married, and the only traces of the old
 system left to-day are the strong bond
 of fellowship which exists among the
 members and the Arcadian spirit Of
 harmony which enables 200 men, wo-
 men and children to dwell together and
 have close business relations without
 the slightest signs of friction
 The growth of the Oneida Community
 as an industrial center has not been ac-
 complished with the noise of trumpets
 and the flying of banners. So quietly
 has it taken place that few people in
 Syracuse have any idea that within
 thirty miles of the city is situated the
 fountain head and principal tributaries
 of a commercial stream which yearly
 carries to the vast ocean of trade hun
 dreds of thousands of silver plated
 spoons and forks and $300,O00 worth of
 silk thread made on the premises
 There are situated factories which put
 up millions of cans of corn, string
 beans, peas, asparagus, cherries. plums and pineapples, make thousands of doz-
 ems of steel traps which are shipped to all parts of America, and put on the
 market steel chains which largely sup
 ply the hardware trade in this country and Canada and are largely exported. The community owns between 800 and 600 acres of land and the value of it's manufacturing plants and holdings is away above the million mark.
 As founded by Moves, the Oneida Community was a religious association claiming to derive its example from the Bible. Moves himself was a finely educated man, being a graduate of Yale University and deep student of the Bible. He possessed a pleasing personality, and when he announced his peculiar views on religious and so- cial questions he soon made a number of converts among the rugged farmers and mechanics of New England, where he first began his work. He encoun- tered great opposition, however, and with his followers determined to mi grate to some distant region, where greater freedom in the practice of their precepts could be enjoyed.
 About this time Jonathan Burt, who owned a few acres of land and rude sawmll on Oneida Creek, became in terested in Moves and his doctrines. and extended an invitation to him to come to Oneida with his followers and use the Burt property as home for the new religion. The invitation was accepted, and leaving their snug New England homes the disciples of Moves followed him into a comparatively un- known country. Oneida valley as they | found it in 1S4S was sparsely settled, | but very fertile, although hardly any | of the land was under cultivation. | Nearby were the rude dwellings of the ' decaying tribe of Oneida Indians,
 From the start it was the idea of | Moves and his followers composing the ! to make a livelihood from | the soil, and horticulture in all of it's | branches was undertaken, under the l direction of Henry Thacker, who had l a genius for fruit raising. New va rieties of fruit were introduced and | grown, but it was long way to the markets, and the venture. which absorbed most of the capital of 1 the community, was not a money mak- ing success.
 When the financial affairs of the were at their lowest ebb. came in the person of Sewall Newhouse, one of the prom nent members. Newhouse was a nat ural born hunter and trapper and also possessed of great mechanical genius There was a blacksmith's forge on the property, and here New house hammered out steel traps for his own use in catching game. AL though rude in construction the traps did the business and it was not long before the Indians and neigh boring farmers came to MT. Newhouse 70 get him to make traps for them. in adjacent places soon heard of the traps and began to keep hem in stock The demand became 90 great that MT, Newhouse could not make traps fast enough, and other of the community were as ,igned to help him. A large order for raps from the Hudson Bay Company, which in some way had learned of Mr. Newhouse's skillfull work, opened he eyes of the community to the and served to divert the members from horticulture to manu- acture as a source of livelihood.
 Early in it's existence the commun- ty acted on it's theory that there hould be the same liberality for ex- and invention in devising lew and improved forms of social life IS was permitted in other things, the vowed object being to "estalolish a better and larger home, and one that would be both a church and practi- al school for improvement of char cter No secret was made of the I manner of the social life of it's mem ,ers: indeed, publicity was openly ourted for paper published dur ne the thirty years existence of the l