The Oneida Community

a bibliography by
Howard A. Landman

Oneida, founded by John H. Noyes, was one of the most successful utopian communes in history. For approximately 30 years, they lived in a gigantic group marriage (over 200 people at the end) with shared property. Avoiding the "back to the land" fantasies which were so prevalent in 1800's (and 1960's!) communes, and which typically resulted in city people trying to be farmers and failing miserably, they founded businesses including a spoon factory which evolved (after their breakup) into the Oneida Silversmiths flatware company.

There is a lot to be learned from their experience. Fortunately, quite a bit has been written about Oneida, including several first-hand accounts. There are collections of Oneida materials at Princeton U., Middle Tennessee State University (microtext), and elsewhere.

Sam Abrams, "Aurea Venera Ignota: The Oneida Community and Coitus Reservatus"
Maren Lockwood Carden, Oneida: Utopian Community to Modern Corporation, Syracuse Univ. Pr., 1998
J. C. Croly ("Jennie June"), Jennie June's Cookbook, American News Company, 1878
Includes recipes from the Oneida Community.
Richard Demaria, Communal Love at Oneida : A Perfectionist Vision of Authority, Property and Sexual Order (Texts and Studies in Religion Series Vol 2), Edwin Mellen Pr., 1984
Hubbard Eastman, Noyesism unveiled; a history of the sect of self-styled Perfectionists with a summary view of their leading doctrines, Brattleboro Vt., 1849
Allan Estlake, The Oneida Community; A Record of an Attempt to Carry Out the Principles of Christian Unselfishness and Scientific Race-Improvement, Ams Pr., June 1973
Robert S. Fogarty, Daily Journal of Oneida Community/Volumes 1-3 : The O.C. Daily/Volumes 4-5 (5 Volumes in 1 Binding), Porcupine Press, 1975
Robert S. Fogarty, Special Love/Special Sex: An Oneida Community Diary (Utopianism and Communitarianism), Syracuse Univ. Pr., October 1994
Lawrence Foster, Religion and Sexuality : The Shakers, the Mormons, and the Oneida Community, Univ. of Illinois Pr., 1984
Lawrence Foster, Women, Family, and Utopia : Communal Experiments of the Shakers, the Oneida Community, and the Mormons, Univ. of Illinois Pr., 1984
Mark Holloway, Heavens on Earth, Dover Pubs., 1966, pp. 180-7
John Andrew Hostetler, Communitarian Societies,
John E. Jacoby, Two Mystic Communities in America, Hyperion Pr., June 1975
Covers Oneida Community and Ephrata Cloister.
Laurence E. Karp, "Past Perfect: John Humphrey Noyes, Stirpiculture, and the Oneida Community", American Journal of Medical Genetics 12 (2): pp. 127-30, June 1982
A eugenics perspective on Oneida.
W. M. Kephart, "Experimental family organization: An historico-cultural report on the Oneida community", in M. Gordon (Ed.), The nuclear family in crisis: The search for an alternative, New York, NY: Harper & Row, 1972
Louis J. Kern, An Ordered Love : Sex Roles and Sexuality in Victorian Utopias : The Shakers, the Mormons, and the Oneida Community, Univ. of North Carolina Press, 1981 (paperback)
Spencer Klaw, Without Sin: The Life and Death of the Oneida Community, Penguin, 1994
Ira Mandelker, Religion, Society, and Utopia in Nineteenth-Century America, Univ. of Massachusetts Pr., August 1984
George Wallingford Noyes, Religious experience of John Humphrey Noyes, founder of the Oneida Community,
John H. Noyes, History Of American Socialisms, Reprint Services
John H. Noyes, The Berean, Reprint Services
John H. Noyes, Bible Communism, Reprint Services
John H. Noyes, Scientific Propagation, Reprint Services
John H. Noyes, The Way of Holiness : A Series of Papers Formerly Published in the Perfectionist, at New Haven, Hyperion Press, 1976
John H. Noyes, Male Continence, AMS Press, 1976
John H. Noyes, Male Continence, Reprint Services
John H. Noyes, Mutual Criticism, Syracuse Univ Pr., June 1975
Pierrepont B. Noyes, A Goodly Heritage, Oneida Limited, 1958
Pierrepont B. Noyes, My Father's House : An Oneida Boyhood, 1937 (reprinted by Reprint Services, 1991)
Oneida Community, Bible Communism : A Compilation from the Annual Reports and Other Publications of the Oneida Association and Its Branches, AMS Press 1973
Oneida Community, Hand-Book of the Oneida Community, With a Sketch of Its Founder, and an Outline of Its Constitution and Doctrines, AMS Press 1988
?, Oneida Community, Syracuse Univ Pr., 1981
Robert A. Parker, Yankee Saint : John Humphrey Noyes and the Oneida Community, Reprint Services, 1993
Jane Kinsley Rich, Lasting Spring: Jessie Catherine Kinsley, Daughter of the Oneida Community, Syracuse Univ Pr., June 1982 (hard); Syracuse Univ Pr., January 1983 (paper)
Constance Noyes Robertson, Oneida Community: An Autobiography, 1851-1876, Syracuse Univ Pr., (reprint?) February 1981
Constance Noyes Robertson, Oneida Community: The Breakup, 1876-1881, Syracuse Univ Pr., September 1972
Constance Noyes Robertson, Oneida Community Profiles, Syracuse Univ Pr., September 1977
A detailed description of life in the famous commune, taken mainly from articles in the community's newspaper 'Circular'. "We formed a raiding party into unknown territory, and came back without loss of men, women, or children."
Robert David Thomas, The Man Who Would Be Perfect : John Humphrey Noyes and the Utopian Impulse,

Last updated 2001 January 17