Ohio inventions and firsts · Achievement · 1844
Utopia, a Fourierist settlement that became an anarchist colony
Followers of Charles Fourier founded Utopia in 1844 on the Ohio River in far southern Franklin Township, Clermont County, after the failure of the Clermont Phalanx. In 1847 Josiah Warren and associates reorganized it as an individualist anarchist colony. Land was individually owned and goods and services were traded by labor notes.
At a glance
- Year
- 1844
- Place
- Utopia (Franklin Township, Clermont County), Clermont County Clermont County
Why it matters
It is described as an early American communal experiment. A flood on December 13, 1847, killed 17 of its 32 residents, and the colony dissolved around 1876.
Who gets the credit is disputed
The Ohio claim. Wikipedia says the settlement was reorganized in 1847 as an individualist anarchist colony by Josiah Warren and associates, and calls Warren the first American philosophical anarchist.
The other claims. Utopia began in 1844 as a Fourierist community, so calling the whole settlement anarchist depends on which years are meant; Wikipedia does not say it was the first anarchist settlement, and that wording is not used here.
Sources
Confidence. Medium: the main facts were confirmed, but some details (often an address or ZIP code) were not.