The Oneida Community

1. The Oneida Community

2. John Humphrey Noyes • Deeply religious graduate of Dartmouth College, inspired by the teachings of Charles Finney and the Shaker Society • Wanted to create a society similar to the Shakers’. • He socialized in the Congressional Church, but was later expelled due to his beliefs.

3. Perfectionism • The belief that people could be without flaws because the second coming of Christ had already occurred. A Rail Road Station in Oneida

4. Complex Marriage • A system in which all the members of a community are married to one another. • Noyes believed that marriage was stopping people from reaching perfection, and he preached that it did not exist in heaven, so it was unnecessary on earth.

5. Social Goals • Noyes’ main goal was to create an equal society for women. • Women would be free from being the property of their husbands • Limited childbirth by encouraging coitus interruptus • Children that were born were placed in community nurseries to lessen the burden of or raising children and give women more oppurtunity. • Women began to wear pantaloons under their dresses and cut their hair short to symbolize their equality with men, Women in Oneida

6. Oneida Community • Noyes first wanted to establish a perfectionist community in his hometown of Putney, Vermont, but the locals there were strongly opposed to complex marriage, so he moved it to Oneida, New York Oneida, New York 1863

7. Oneida Community • The community economy was supported by the selling of steel animal traps, which was very successful, so they moved on to making silverware. • Noyes was forced to leave the country to escape charges of adultery • After the Noyes’ departure, the community abandons complex marriage • They create their own silver company, Oneida Community, Ltd. Home in Canada where Noyes lived out the rest of his life

8. Impact of Oneida Community • The community questioned traditional customs of the emerging capitalist society, and challenged marriage and family life Oneida Community Band