Brook Farm, a transcendentalist Utopian experiment, was put into practice by transcendentalist former Unitarian minister George Ripley at a farm in West Roxbury, Massachusetts, at that time nine miles from Boston. The community, in operation from 1841 to 1847, was inspired by the socialist concepts of Charles Fourier. It was based (as many later utopias would be) on the concept of self-reliance, which powers much of the utopian movement. The actual farm they lived on was influential to many writers like Thoreau as they rejected civilization and its injustices and desired to be secluded. The Brook Farm utopia was intended to rely on agriculture, whereas the moderately more successful utopia of the Oneidas was based on consumer goods like furniture. Jump to: navigation, search Transcendentalism was the name of a group of new ideas in literature, religion, culture, and philosophy that advocates that there is an ideal spiritual state that transcends the physical and empirical and is only realized through a knowledgeable intuitive awareness that is conditional upon the individual. ... Utopia, in its most common and general positive meaning, refers to the human efforts to create a better society, a perfect society that does not exist (yet). ... Historic Unitarianism believed in the oneness of God as opposed to traditional Christian belief in the Trinity (Father, Son, and Holy Spirit). ... Jump to: navigation, search George Ripley (1802-July 4, 1880) was an American social reformer, Unitarian, and Transcendentalist. ... Originally part of the town of Roxbury, West Roxbury formed its own government in 1851 and was annexed by Boston in 1874. ... Jump to: navigation, search State nickname: Bay State Other U.S. States Capital Boston Largest city Boston Governor Mitt Romney (R) Senators Edward Kennedy (D) John Kerry (D) Official languages English Area 27,360 km² (44th)  - Land 20,317 km²  - Water 7,043 km² (25. ... Alternative meanings: Boston (disambiguation) The 18th-century Old State House in Boston is surrounded by tall buildings of the 19th and 20th centuries. ... 1841 is a common year starting on Friday (link will take you to calendar). ... 1847 was a common year starting on Friday (see link for calendar). ... The color red and particularly the red flag are traditional symbols of Socialism. ... François Marie Charles Fourier was a French utopian socialist. ... Self-Reliance is an essay by Ralph Waldo Emerson. ... Jump to: navigation, search Henry David Thoreau Henry David Thoreau (July 12, 1817 – May 6, 1862; born David Henry Thoreau) was an American author, naturalist, pacifist, tax resister and philosopher who is famous for Walden (available at wikisource) on simple living amongst nature and Civil Disobedience (available at wikisource) on... Jump to: navigation, search A civilization or civilisation has a variety of meanings related to human society. ... The Oneida Society (Oneida Community) was a utopian commune founded by John H. Noyes in 1848 near Oneida, New York. ... In economics, consumers are individuals or households that consume goods and services generated within the economy. ... Jump to: navigation, search Furniture is the collective term for the movable objects which support the human body (seating furniture and beds), provide storage, and hold objects on horizontal surfaces above the ground. ...

Agriculture was never very successful at Brook Farm, which in fact was sited on land not very suitable for agriculture. Brook Farm also was an educational enterprise, and ran schools at all levels from primary to preparation for college. These, in fact, were the financially profitable part of Brook Farm's operations. A school is most commonly a place designated for learning. ... The term college (Latin collegium) is most often used today to denote an educational institution. ...

Nathaniel Hawthorne was a founding member of Brook Farm and presented a fictionalized portrait of it in his novel, The Blithedale Romance. (He acknowledged the resemblance in his introduction, saying "in the 'Blithedale' of this volume, many readers will probably suspect a faint and not very faithful shadowing of Brook Farm, in Roxbury, which (now a little more than ten years ago) was occupied and cultivated by a company of socialists.") Some have seen a resemblance between Margaret Fuller and Hawthorne's fictional character Zenobia. In the novel, a visitor—a writer like Hawthorne—finds that hard farm labor is not conducive to intellectual creativity: Jump to: navigation, search Nathaniel Hawthorne (July 4, 1804 – May 19, 1864) was a 19th century American novelist and short story writer. ... The Blithedale Romance (1852) was the third of the major romances of Nathaniel Hawthorne. ... Sarah Margaret Fuller (May 23, 1810 - June 19, 1850) was a journalist, critic and womens rights activist. ...

We had pleased ourselves with delectable visions of the spiritualization of labor.... [but] the clods of earth, which we so constantly belabored and turned over and over, were never etherealized into thought. Our thoughts, on the contrary, were fast becoming cloddish. Our labor symbolized nothing, and left us mentally sluggish in the dusk of the evening. Intellectual activity is incompatible with any large amount of bodily exercise. The yeoman and the scholar—the yeoman and the man of finest moral culture, though not the man of sturdiest sense and integrity—are two distinct individuals, and can never be melted or welded into one substance.

During its later years, the Brook Farm community became more and more committed to Fourierist theories, and committed itself to building an ambitious communal building known as the "Phylanstery." When this building caught fire and burned to the ground in 1846, the community's hopes perished with it. 1846 was a common year starting on Thursday (see link for calendar). ...

External link

• "Transcendental ideas: social reform"History of Brook Farm
• history of Brook Farm