Editing Harmony Society (section)

===Second settlement: Harmony, Indiana===
[[Image:NewHarmonyIndiana.jpg|thumb|Harmony Society buildings in [[New Harmony, Indiana]].]]
{{Main|New Harmony, Indiana}}

In 1814 the Harmony Society moved to the Indiana Territory, where it initially acquired approximately {{convert|3,500|acre|km2}} of land along the [[Wabash River]] in Posey County and later acquired more.<ref>Arndt, ''George Rapp's Harmony Society'', p. 145.</ref> Over the next ten years the Society built a thriving new community they called Harmonie or Harmony on the Wabash in the Indiana wilderness. (The town's name was changed to New Harmony after the Harmonists left in 1824.) The Harmonists entered into agriculture and manufacture on a larger scale than they had done in Pennsylvania. When the Harmonists advertised their Indiana property for sale in 1824, they had acquired {{convert|20,000|acre|km2}} of land, {{convert|2,000|acre|km2}} of which was under cultivation.<ref>Arndt, ''George Rapp's Harmony Society'', p. 295.</ref>

During the summer and fall of 1814, many Harmonists fell sick from fever ([[malaria]]) and work on the new town nearly ceased.<ref>Arndt, ''George Rapp's Harmony Society'', p. 147.</ref> During this time the Society lost about 120 people and others fell ill until conditions were improved and the swamps around the area were drained.<ref name=usi /> Despite these illnesses, construction of the new town continued. By 1819 the Harmonites had built 150 log homes, a church, a community storehouse, barns, stables, and a tavern, along with thriving shops and mills, and cleared land for farming.<ref>Arndt, ''George Rapp's Harmony Society'', p. 206–207.</ref> As the new settlement in Indiana grew, it also began to attract new arrivals, including emigrants from Germany, who expected the Harmonists to pay for their passage to America.<ref>Arndt, ''George Rapp's Harmony Society'', p. 182–198.</ref>

Visitors to the new town commented on its growing commercial and industrial work. In 1819 the town had a steam-operated wool carding and spinning factory, a brewery, distillery, vineyards, and a winery,<ref>Karl J. R. Arndt, ''A Documentary History of the Indiana Decade of the Harmony Society 1814–1824'' (Indianapolis: [[Indiana Historical Society]], 1975), 1:744–745.</ref> but not all visitors were impressed with the growing communal town on the frontier.<ref>Arndt, ''A Documentary History of the Indiana Decade of the Harmony Society'', 1:784.</ref> The Society also had visitors from another communal religious society, the [[Shakers]]. In 1816 meetings between the Shakers and Harmonists considered a possible union of the two societies, but  religious differences between the two groups halted the union.<ref>Arndt, ''A Documentary History of the Indiana Decade of the Harmony Society'', 1:225–229.</ref> Members of the groups remained, however, in contact over the years. George Rapp's daughter and others lived for a time at the Shaker settlement in [[West Union (Busro), Indiana|West Union, Indiana]], where the Shakers helped a number of Harmonites learn the [[English language]].<ref>Arndt, ''A Documentary History of the Indiana Decade of the Harmony Society'', 1:230.</ref>

The Harmonist community continued to thrive during the 1820s. The Society shipped its surplus agricultural produce and manufactured goods throughout the Ohio and Mississippi valleys or sold them through their stores at Harmony and Shawneetown and their agents in Pittsburgh, Saint Louis, Louisville, and elsewhere.<ref>Bole, p. 79.</ref> Under Frederick Rapp's financial management the Society prospered, but he soon wished for a location better suited to manufacturing and commercial purposes.<ref name=Bole91>Bole, p. 91.</ref> They had initially selected the land near the Wabash River for its isolation and opportunity for expansion, but the Harmonites were now a great distance from the eastern markets and trade in this location was not to their liking. They also had to deal with unfriendly neighbors.<ref name=usi /> As [[Abolitionism in the United States|abolitionists]], the Harmonites faced disagreeable elements from slavery supporters in [[Kentucky]], only {{convert|15|mi|km}} away, which caused them much annoyance.{{citation needed|date=June 2012}} By 1824 the decision had been made to sell their property in Indiana and search for land to the east.<ref>Arndt, ''George Rapp's Harmony Society'', p. 287.</ref>

On January 3, 1825, the Harmonists and [[Robert Owen]], a Welsh-born industrialist and social reformer, came to a final agreement for the sale of the Society's land and buildings in Indiana for $150,000. Owen named the town New Harmony, and by May, the last of the Harmony Society's remaining members returned to Pennsylvania.<ref>Arndt, ''George Rapp's Harmony Society'', p. 298.</ref>