The Communistic Societies of the United States: The Aurora And Bethel Communes.: I.—Aurora in Oregon
TWENTY-NINE miles south of Portland, on the Oregon and California Railroad, lies the village of Aurora, more commonly known along the road as "Dutchtown." As you approach it on the train, you will notice on an eminence to the left a large wooden church; in the deep ravine which is spanned by a railroad-bridge, a saw-mill; and, scattered irregularly over the neighboring country, a number of houses, most of them differing from usual village dwellings in the United States, mainly because of their uncommon size, and the entire absence of ornament. They are three stories high, sometimes nearly a hundred feet deep, and look like factories. Opposite the railroad station, upon elevated ground, stands one of these houses, which is called the hotel, and is an excellent, clean country inn, famous all over Oregon for good living. When I mentioned to an acquaintance in Portland my purpose to spend some days at Aurora, he replied, "Oh, yes—Dutchtown; you'll feed better there than any where else in the state;" and on further inquiry I found that I might expect to see there also the best orchards in Oregon, the most ingenious expedients for drying fruits, and an excellent system of agriculture. Beyond these practical points, and the further statement that "these Dutch are a queer people," information about them is not general among Oregonians. The inn, or "hotel," however, at Aurora, is used as a summer resort by residents of Portland; the Aurora band is employed at festivities in Portland; the pleasure-grounds of the community are opened Shelby County, Missouri, was then a new country. The colonists took up four sections, or two thousand five hundred and sixty acres of land, to which they added from time to time until they possessed four thousand acres. Upon a part of this estate they gradually established a distillery, grist-mill, sawmill, carding machinery, a woolen-mill, and all the mechanical
In order to make intelligible the means as well as the ways of their success, I must here explain what are the social principles to which they agree, and in accordance with which they have worked since 1844. They are remarkable chiefly for their simplicity. Dr. Keil teaches, and they hold that— 1st. All government should be parental, to imitate, as they say, the parental government of God. 2d. That therefore societies should be formed upon the model of the family, having all interests and all property absolutely in common; all the members laboring faithfully for the general welfare and support, and drawing the means of living from the general treasury. 3d. That, however, neither religion nor the harmony of nature teaches community in any thing further than property and labor. Hence the family life is strictly maintained; and the Aurora Communists marry and are given in marriage, and raise and train children precisely as do their neighbors the Pike farmers. They reject absolutely all sexual irregularities, and inculcate marriage and support the family relation as religious duties, as the outside world does. Each family has its own house, or separate apartments in one of the large buildings. 4th. Dr. Keil, who is not only their president, but also their preacher, holds the fundamental truth of Christianity to be, "Love one another," and interprets this in so broad and literal To me he spoke with some vehemence against sects and creeds as anti-Christian. Sunday is usually a day of recreation and quiet amusement, with music and visiting among the people. 5th. The children of the community are sent to school, there being at Aurora a common or free school, in which an old man, a member of the society, who bears a remarkable resemblance to the late Horace Greeley, is teacher. The school is supported as other free schools of the state are; but it is open all the year round, which is not the case generally with country schools. They aim to teach only the rudimentary studies— reading, writing, and arithmetic. 6th. The system of government is as simple as possible. Dr. Keil, the founder, is president of the community, and autocrat. He has for his advisers four of the older members, who are selected by himself. In the management of affairs he consults these, whose opinions, I imagine, usually agree with his. When any vitally important change or experiment is contemplated, the matter is discussed by the whole community, and nothing is done then without a general assent. 7th. Every man is expected to labor for the general good, but there are no established hours of work, nor is any one compelled to labor at any special pursuit. 8th. Plain living and rigid economy are inculcated as duties from each to the whole; and to labor regularly, and to waste nothing, are important parts of the "whole duty of man." 9th. Each workshop has its foreman, who comes, it would Their living is extremely plain. The houses and apartments are without carpets; the women wear calico on Sunday as well as during the week, and the sun-bonnet is their head-covering. The men wear ready-made clothing of no particular style. Cleanliness is, so far as I saw, a conspicuous virtue of the society. Dr. Keil, the president, was the only person with whom I came in contact who was not very neat. He is a snuff-taker; and he walked over the orchard with me in an untidy pair of carpet slippers. They appear to be people of few ceremonies. On a Sunday I attended a wedding; the marriage took place in the school-house, and was witnessed by a small congregation of young people, friends of the bride and groom. The young girls came to the wedding in clean calico dresses and sun-bonnets; and I noticed that even the bride wore only a very plain woolen dress, with a bit of bright ribbon around her neck. The ceremony was performed by the schoolmaster, who is also a justice of the peace; when it was over, the company quietly and somewhat shyly walked up to congratulate the newly married, some Occasionally, I was told, they have had as members idle or drunken men. Such are admonished of their wrong courses; and if they are incorrigible, they always, I was assured, leave the place. "An idler or dissolute person has not the sympathies of our people; he has no connection with the industries of the society; as he does not work, he can hardly be so brazen as to ask for supplies. The practical result is that presently he disappears from among us." "Do you have no disagreements from envy or jealousy among you," I asked Dr. Keil; who replied, "Very seldom now; the people have been too long and too thoroughly trained; they are too well satisfied of the wisdom of our plan of life; they are practiced in self-sacrifice, and know that selfishness is evil and the source of unhappiness. In the early days we used sometimes to have trouble. Thus a man would say, 'I brought money into the society, and this other man brought none; why should he have as much as I;' but my reply was, 'Here is your money—take it; it is not necessary; but while you remain, remember that you are no better than he.' Again, another might say, 'My labor brings one thousand dollars a year to the society, his only two hundred and fifty;' but my answer was, 'Thank God that he made you so much abler, stronger, to help your brother; but take care lest your poorer brother do not some day have to help you, when you are crippled, or ill, or disabled.'" The children who have in these years, since 1844, grown up in the community generally remain. I spoke with a number of men who had thus passed all but their earliest years in the society, and who were content. Men sometimes return, repentant, after leaving the society. "The boys and girls know that they can leave at any time; there is no compulsion upon any one; hence no one cares to go. But they generally see that As all work for the common good, so all are supplied from the common stores. I asked the purchasing agent about the book-keeping of the place; he replied, "As there is no trading, few accounts are needed. Much of what we raise is consumed on the place, and of what the people use no account is kept. Thus, if a family needs flour, it goes freely to the mill and gets what it requires. If butter, it goes to the store in the same way. We need only to keep account of what we sell of our own products, and of what we buy from abroad, and these accounts check each other. When we make money, we invest it in land." Further, I was told that tea, coffee, and sugar are roughly allowanced to each family. Each family has either a house, or apartments in one of the large houses. Each has a garden patch, and keeps chickens; and every year a number of pigs are set apart for each household, according to its number. These are fed with the leavings of the table, and are fattened and killed in the winter, and salted down. Fresh beef is not commonly used. If any one needs vegetables, he can get them in the large garden. There seemed to be an abundance of good plain food every where. Originally, and until 1872, all the property stood in Dr. Keil's name; but in that year he, finding himself growing old, and urged too, I imagine, by some of the leading men, made a division of the whole estate, and gave a title-deed to each head of a family of a suitable piece of property—to a farmer a farm, to a carpenter a house and shop, and so on. If there was any heart-burning over this division, I could not hear of it; and it appears to have made no difference in the conduct of the society, which labors on as before for the common welfare. I asked, "What, then, if you have divided all the property, will you do for the young people as they grow up?" Question. I have noticed that when young girls grow up they usually manifest a taste for ribbons and finery. How do you manage with such cases? Answer. Well, they get what they want. They have only to ask at the supply store; only if they go too far—if it amounts to vanity—they are admonished that they are not acting according to the principles of love and temperance; they are putting undue expense on the society; they are making themselves different from their neighbors. It is not necessary to say this, however, for our people are now all trained in sound principles, and there is but little need for admonition. Q. But suppose such a warning as you speak of were not taken? A. Well, then they have leave to go into the world. If they want to be like the world, that is the place for them. And don't you see that if they are so headstrong and full of vanity they would not stay with us anyhow? They would not feel at home with us. Q. Suppose one of your young men has the curiosity to see the world, as young men often have? A. We give him money; he has only to ask the council. We say to him: "You want to live in the world; well, you must earn your own living there; here is money, however, for your journey." And we give him according to his character and worth in the society. Q. Suppose a young man wanted to go to college? Dr. Keil is a short, burly man, with blue eyes, whitish hair, and white beard. I took him to be a Swiss from his appearance, but his language—he spoke German with me—showed him to be a Prussian. He seemed excitable and somewhat suspicious; gave no tokens whatever of having studied any book but the Bible, and that only as it helped him to enforce his own philosophy. He was very quick to turn every thought toward the one subject of community life; took his illustrations mostly from the New Testament; and evidently laid much stress on the parental character of God. As he discussed, his eyes lighted up with a somewhat fierce fire; and I thought I could perceive a fanatic, certainly a person of a very determined, imperious will, united to a narrow creed. As to that creed: He said it was desirable and needful so to arrange our lives as to bring them into harmony with natural laws and with God's laws; that we must all trust in Him for strength and wisdom; that we all needed his protection—and as he thus spoke we turned suddenly into a little inclosure As we walked along through the vegetable garden and vineyard, I saw some elderly women hoeing the vines and clearing the ground of weeds. I must not forget to say that the culture of their orchards, vineyards, and gardens is thorough and admirable. Dr. Keil said, nodding to the women, "They like this work; it is their choice to spend the afternoon thus. If I should tell them to go and put on fine clothes and lounge around, they would be very much aggrieved." The members are all Germans or Pennsylvanians. They are of several Protestant sects; and there is even one Jew, but no Roman Catholics. The band played on Sunday evening for an hour or more, but did not attract many people. Boys were playing ball in the street at the same time. Some bought tobacco; which led me to ask again about the use of money. The question was not in any case satisfactorily answered; but I have reason to believe that a little selfish earning of private spending money is winked at. For instance, the man whose daughter's wedding I attended kept a few hives of bees; and in answer to a question I was told he did not turn their honey into the general treasury; what he did not consume he was allowed to sell. There is an air of untidiness about the streets of the settlement which is unpleasing. There is a piece of water, which might easily be made very pretty, but it is allowed to turn into a quagmire. But few of the door-yards are neatly kept. The village seems to have been laid out at haphazard. Moreover, their stock is of poor breeds; the pigs especially being wretched razor-backed creatures. As to the people—there can be no doubt that they are happy and contented. In a country where labor is scarce and highly paid, and where the rewards of patient industry in any calling are sure and large, it is not to be supposed that such a society as Aurora would have held together nineteen years if its members were not in every way satisfied with their plan of life, and with the results they have attained under it. What puzzled me was to find a considerable number of people in the United States satisfied with so little. What they have secured is neighbors, sufficient food probably of a better kind than is enjoyed by the ordinary Oregon farmer, and a distinct and certain provision for their old age, or for helplessness. The last seemed, in all their minds, a source of great comfort. Pecuniarily their success has not been brilliant, for if the property were sold out and the money divided, the eighty or ninety families would not receive more than three thousand or thirty-five hundred dollars each; and a farmer in Oregon must have been a very unfortunate man, who, coming here nineteen years ago with nothing, should not be worth more than this sum now, if he had labored as steadily and industriously, and lived as economically as the Aurora people have.
