Ruskin Colony - Origins and Goals

Origins and Goals

The Ruskin Colony was originally founded by Julius Augustus Wayland (1854–1912), a newspaper editor and socialist from Indiana. The roots of the Ruskin project can be found in the movement within American socialism at the time towards the creation of new model colonies which would, in theory, challenge the American industrial system by creating ethical alternatives built in rural settings. The idea that new settlements such as Ruskin would eventually bring forth a revolution referred to as the "co-operative commonwealth" stood in contrast to socialists who believed that it was more important to do political and social organizing within the cities, the centers of industry. According to W. Fitzhugh Brundage in the book A Socialist Utopia in the New South: "The wastefulness and ugliness of competitive individualism, so glaringly apparent in late nineteenth-century cities, would be replaced by the efficient creation and collective control of wealth and technology" in this new settlement.

Read more about this topic:  Ruskin Colony

Famous quotes containing the words origins and, origins and/or goals:

    Lucretius
    Sings his great theory of natural origins and of wise conduct; Plato
    smiling carves dreams, bright cells
    Of incorruptible wax to hive the Greek honey.
    Robinson Jeffers (1887–1962)

    The settlement of America had its origins in the unsettlement of Europe. America came into existence when the European was already so distant from the ancient ideas and ways of his birthplace that the whole span of the Atlantic did not widen the gulf.
    Lewis Mumford (1895–1990)

    If you really think about it, everything is wonderful in this world, everything except for our thoughts and deeds when we forget about the loftier goals of existence, about our human dignity.
    Anton Pavlovich Chekhov (1860–1904)