Robert Owen - New Lanark and New Harmony.
Many of you have been on my Scottish Tours by Chauffeured car or people carrier, and will have visited New Lanark with me.
When I carried out my Tours of New Lanark, I was unaware that after he left Scotland, he moved in 1825 to Indiana USA, where he bought a former Religious Community called Harmony, which he renamed New Harmony. I was made aware of New Harmony in a rather unusual way, by Ric Savage in his TV programme Savage Family Diggers, in which Ric, and his enlightened crew salvage historical artifacts using methods most US Archaeologists will be familiar with, (the use of dynamite and heavy diggers).
New Lanark
First a short note about New Lanark. In 1799 Robert Owen married the daughter of David Dale, the owner of New Lanark, and became a business partner of his. He instigated a number of reforms, to improve living conditions for the workforce, before moving to Indiana to create a Utopian socialist community. New Lanark exists today as a Protected Village with housing, now updated by the New Lanark Housinga Association.
New Harmony
In 1825 Owen purchased the former Religious Community of Harmony in Indiana, where he began a brave experimental society based on the Socialist principles of equality and fairness to all workers.
Renamed New Harmony, which was a society based on his theories for a perfect, society, that it should number between 1200 and 2000 people and be run on principles of fairness and equality. Unfortunately, his population was a mixture of committed and enlightened people, who were outnumbered by vagrants and self seekers, and the experiment failed after two or three years. However, Owen’s utopian dream brought significant contributions to American scientific and educational theory, study, and practice.
Robert Owen
My thanks and acknowledgment to Richard Thornton, for his excellent article on Robert Owen and New Harmony.
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