Pleasant Hill, Kentucky,
USA
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country Continental United States, primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., ...
, is the site of a
Shaker
Shaker or Shakers may refer to:
Religious groups
* Shakers, a historically significant Christian sect
* Indian Shakers, a smaller Christian denomination
Objects and instruments
* Shaker (musical instrument), an indirect struck idiophone
* Cock ...
religious
Religion is usually defined as a social system, social-cultural system of designated religious behaviour, behaviors and practices, morality, morals, beliefs, worldviews, religious text, texts, sacred site, sanctified places, prophecy, prophecie ...
community that was active from 1805 to 1910. Following a
preservationist Preservationist is generally understood to mean ''historic preservationist'': one who advocates to preserve architecturally or historically significant buildings, structures, objects, or sites from demolition or degradation. Historic preservation us ...
effort that began in 1961, the site, now a
National Historic Landmark
A National Historic Landmark (NHL) is a building, district, object, site, or structure that is officially recognized by the United States government for its outstanding historical significance. Only some 2,500 (~3%) of over 90,000 places listed ...
, has become a popular
tourist destination
A tourist attraction is a place of interest that Tourism, tourists visit, typically for its inherent or an exhibited natural or cultural value, historical significance, natural or built beauty, offering leisure and amusement.
Types
Places of ...
. Shaker Village of Pleasant Hill, or Shakertown, as it is known by residents of the area, is located 25 miles (40 km) southwest of
Lexington, in
Kentucky's Bluegrass region
The Bluegrass region is a geographic region in the U.S. state of Kentucky. It makes up the central and northern part of the state, roughly bounded by the cities of Frankfort, Paris, Richmond and Stanford. The Bluegrass region is characterized ...
. It is a
National Historic Landmark
A National Historic Landmark (NHL) is a building, district, object, site, or structure that is officially recognized by the United States government for its outstanding historical significance. Only some 2,500 (~3%) of over 90,000 places listed ...
District.
History
Founding
![Shakertown Center Family 2005-05-27](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/97/Shakertown_Center_Family_2005-05-27.jpeg)
The
Second Great Awakening
The Second Great Awakening was a Protestant religious revival during the early 19th century in the United States. The Second Great Awakening, which spread religion through revivals and emotional preaching, sparked a number of reform movements. R ...
began in the late 1700s and continued into the early 19th century. A
revival was characterized by large
camp meeting
The camp meeting is a form of Protestant Christian religious service originating in England and Scotland as an evangelical event in association with the communion season. It was held for worship, preaching and communion on the American frontier d ...
s, where ministers from various
Protestant
Protestantism is a Christian denomination, branch of Christianity that follows the theological tenets of the Reformation, Protestant Reformation, a movement that began seeking to reform the Catholic Church from within in the 16th century agai ...
groups would preach for long periods, with music and dancing often adding to the emotional pitch of the congregation. These religious gatherings sometimes drew thousands of observers and participants in the Ohio Valley of
Kentucky
Kentucky ( , ), officially the Commonwealth of Kentucky, is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States and one of the states of the Upper South. It borders Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio to the north; West Virginia and Virginia to ...
. They were a form of community for people living scattered in relative isolation on the frontier the rest of the time.
The powerful interest in religion sweeping the region inspired the
Shakers
The United Society of Believers in Christ's Second Appearing, more commonly known as the Shakers, are a Millenarianism, millenarian Restorationism, restorationist Christianity, Christian sect founded in England and then organized in the Unit ...
to broaden their ministry into Kentucky.
Lucy Wright
Lucy Wright (February 5, 1760 – 1821) was the leader of the United Society of Believers in Christ’s Second Appearing, also known as the Shakers, from 1796 until 1821. At that time, a woman's leadership of a religious sect was a radical departur ...
, the head of the Shakers' parent Ministry at New Lebanon, New York, decided to send missionaries west.
On January 1, 1805, with eleven Shaker communities already established in
New York
New York most commonly refers to:
* New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York
* New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States
New York may also refer to:
Film and television
* '' ...
and
New England
New England is a region comprising six states in the Northeastern United States: Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Vermont. It is bordered by the state of New York to the west and by the Canadian provinces ...
, three Shaker
missionaries
A missionary is a member of a religious group which is sent into an area in order to promote its faith or provide services to people, such as education, literacy, social justice, health care, and economic development.Thomas Hale 'On Being a Mi ...
, John Meacham, Benjamin Seth Youngs (older brother of
Isaac N. Youngs Isaac Newton Youngs (July 4, 1793 – August 7, 1865) was a member of the Shakers. He was a prolific scribe, correspondent, and diarist who documented the history of the New Lebanon, New York Church Family of Shakers from 1815 to 1865.
Early li ...
), and
Issachar Bates, set out to find new converts. Traveling more than a thousand miles, most of the way on foot, they joined the pioneers then pouring into the western lands by way of
Cumberland Gap
The Cumberland Gap is a pass through the long ridge of the Cumberland Mountains, within the Appalachian Mountains, near the junction of the U.S. states of Kentucky, Virginia, and Tennessee. It is famous in American colonial history for its rol ...
and the
Ohio River
The Ohio River is a long river in the United States. It is located at the boundary of the Midwestern and Southern United States, flowing southwesterly from western Pennsylvania to its mouth on the Mississippi River at the southern tip of Illino ...
.
By August, they had gathered a small group of new adherents to the doctrine of
Mother Ann Lee
Ann Lee (29 February 1736 – 8 September 1784), commonly known as Mother Ann Lee, was the founding leader of the United Society of Believers in Christ's Second Appearing, or the Shakers.
After nearly two decades of participation in a re ...
who believed in celibacy. Ann Lee was born February 29, 1736, in Manchester, England. She was a member of the Quaker sect called the Shaking Quakers. She ran afoul of the law and was imprisoned for trying to teach her sect's beliefs. During her time in prison, she claimed to have a vision that she herself was the second coming of Christ. Upon her release in 1772, she founded a new religious sect, which came to be commonly known as the Shakers because of the adherents' dancing and motions. She taught that God was a dual personage, male and female, instead of the masculine-orientated traditional belief in an all-male trinity. She interpreted the passage in Genesis that stated "So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female, created he them," to mean that both sexes were in God's image therefore God was both male and female. She acknowledged that Jesus was the first coming of the messiah but believed the second coming had already occurred with herself, Ann Lee, based on her vision. Thus Shakers believed they were living in the last millennium and since all people shared a brother/sister relationship, they should not marry as there was no longer a need to procreate. Instead they believed people should live communally as a family of brothers and sisters.
Couples joining the community lived separately, with their young children and foundlings raised in a nursery. Children could decide whether to remain in the community when they reached the age of maturity. Many of those proselytes had earlier been influenced by the fervent
Cane Ridge Revival
The Cane Ridge Revival was a large camp meeting that was held in Cane Ridge, Kentucky, from August 6 to August 12 or 13, 1801.E. Michael, & Rusten, S. (2005). The complete book of when & where in the Bible and throughout history. Wheaton, IL: Tynd ...
.
In December 1806, forty-four converts of legal age signed a covenant agreeing to mutual support and the common ownership of property. They began living together on the farm of Elisha Thomas, whose lands formed the nucleus of the Pleasant Hill Shaker village. Additional converts and property were quickly added, with the community occupying . By 1812 three communal families—East, Center, and West—had been formed, and a fourth, North, was established as a "gathering family" for prospective converts. On June 2, 1814, 128 Believers bound themselves together in a more formal covenant, which established the community in the pattern of the Shaker Ministry's village at
New Lebanon, New York
New Lebanon is a town in Columbia County, New York, United States, southeast of Albany. In 1910, 1,378 people lived in New Lebanon. The population was 2,305 at the 2010 census.
The town of New Lebanon is in the northeastern corner of Columbia ...
.
Early years
![Shakertown Staircase 2005-05-27](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/7f/Shakertown_Staircase_2005-05-27.jpeg)
Though the Kentucky Shakers were poor when they started out, they were skilled farmers who made the most of their property. Even the most skeptical observers saw that they prospered, in part because of the high quality of their products. In 1852, a visitor wrote that every article of Shaker produce sold for a third more than what other farmers received.
Another reason for their prosperity was their location, which was ideal for marketing their produce and home manufactures. By 1816, they regularly traveled the rivers to larger cities (some at great distances, such as
) to sell their wares.
The Pleasant Hill Shakers raised broom corn and made flat brooms so good that they sold for more than "ordinary" brooms. They also raised fruit and sold it dried or as preserves (more than ten tons of preserves in one year). Like many other Shaker communities, they raised and sold garden seeds.
["Shaker Farming in Kentucky," ''Pittsfield Sun'', January 15, 1857.]
By 1825, the Pleasant Hill Shaker village was a handsome community with large stone and brick dwellings and shops, grassy lawns, and stone sidewalks. One visitor, though dubious about their mode of worship, was impressed by their prosperity and delighted by their hospitality. He concluded that they were a "trafficking, humane, honest and thrifty people."
["Kentucky," ew Bern''Carolina Sentinel'', May 21, 1825, p. 1.]
Over the years they expanded their land holdings by acquiring adjacent farms for orchards and fields, and fenced it with stone walls. According to a visitor in 1857, they had paid a hired man for twelve years to work full-time at building stone walls, and he had completed forty miles of walls, at a cost to the Shakers of about $1000 per mile. Their buildings were large, substantial, and well-built, and furnished with modern conveniences.
The Pleasant Hill community was known for its excellent livestock. In 1838, Shaker John Bryant sold one pair of Berkshire hogs for $500. In the 1850s they kept about 500 head of well-fed cattle, and bred imported cows to improve their herd's milk production. They practiced
selective breeding
Selective breeding (also called artificial selection) is the process by which humans use animal breeding and plant breeding to selectively develop particular phenotypic traits (characteristics) by choosing which typically animal or plant mal ...
and scientific agriculture well before the average farmer did. They also raised Saxony sheep for the wool, which Shaker sisters spun and wove into cloth for home use.
The Pleasant Hill Shakers were also known for their labor-saving engineering accomplishments. They had a
municipal water system
A water supply network or water supply system is a system of engineered hydrologic and hydraulic components that provide water supply. A water supply system typically includes the following:
# A drainage basin (see water purification – source ...
well before some towns in their area. By 1825 they had pumps in their kitchens for the sisters' convenience (at a time when many farmwives had to carry water from a creek). Their
mill
Mill may refer to:
Science and technology
*
* Mill (grinding)
* Milling (machining)
* Millwork
* Textile mill
* Steel mill, a factory for the manufacture of steel
* List of types of mill
* Mill, the arithmetic unit of the Analytical Engine early ...
had an
elevator
An elevator or lift is a wire rope, cable-assisted, hydraulic cylinder-assisted, or roller-track assisted machine that vertically transports people or freight between floors, levels, or deck (building), decks of a building, watercraft, ...
for moving grain to the upper floor, and they had a mechanical corn sheller.
Shaker sisters also had the benefits of machinery for doing laundry by horse power.
One of their barns included an upper floor for storage of grain and hay, a cutting machine for chopping fodder, and an ingenious railway for delivering feed to the cattle.
Through the Civil War and Reconstruction era
The Kentucky Shakers' locations, however, were problematic during the
American Civil War
The American Civil War (April 12, 1861 – May 26, 1865; also known by other names) was a civil war in the United States. It was fought between the Union ("the North") and the Confederacy ("the South"), the latter formed by states th ...
.
Even before the war began, the Pleasant Hill Shakers ran into controversy. The New York-based religious organization had a policy of pacifism and was also opposed to
slavery
Slavery and enslavement are both the state and the condition of being a slave—someone forbidden to quit one's service for an enslaver, and who is treated by the enslaver as property. Slavery typically involves slaves being made to perf ...
. Members who made up the Pleasant Hill society mostly came from the region and, as a result, ''may'' have had a variety of views on the war and slavery, although this cannot be proven by the sources. Formally they adhered to the principles of the Shakers. The Shakers at Pleasant Hill adopted the practice of buying and freeing slaves. In 1825, because of mounting tensions over slavery in Pleasant Hill's surrounding community, a mob attacked Pleasant Hill and destroyed some of its facilities.
While members of Pleasant Hill were sympathetic to the Union, their Southern location made them the target of some neighbors and bands of extremists. (This experience was relatively similar to the
Koinonia
() is a transliterated form of the Koine Greek, Greek word , which refers to concepts such as fellowship, joint participation, the share which one has in anything, a gift jointly contributed, a collection, a contribution. It identifies the ideal ...
situation during the
Civil Rights Movement
The civil rights movement was a nonviolent social and political movement and campaign from 1954 to 1968 in the United States to abolish legalized institutional Racial segregation in the United States, racial segregation, Racial discrimination ...
.) Pleasant Hill was at risk during the war, although it did not suffer as much damage as its sister colony at
South Union, Kentucky.
The Civil War depleted Pleasant Hill's resources. The members of Pleasant Hill fed thousands of soldiers who came begging, particularly in the weeks surrounding the
Battle of Perryville
The Battle of Perryville, also known as the Battle of Chaplin Hills, was fought on October 8, 1862, in the Chaplin Hills west of Perryville, Kentucky, as the culmination of the Confederate Heartland Offensive (Kentucky Campaign) during the A ...
. Both armies "nearly ate
hem
A hem in sewing is a garment finishing method, where the edge of a piece of cloth is folded and sewn to prevent unravelling of the fabric and to adjust the length of the piece in garments, such as at the end of the sleeve or the bottom of the ga ...
out of house and home." They also lost manpower when some young Shaker brethren left to join the army.
More importantly, the social environment and cultural changes in the decades before and after the war made Shaker life less appealing for converts. During Reconstruction and later, very few new converts joined the Shakers.
Last days
Kentucky Shakers had a number of problems after the Civil War, which had sapped their communities' strength. They continued to take in orphans, but few stayed past the end of their indentures. So-called "Winter Shakers", impoverished locals feigning interest in joining the colony during the cold season, were a drain on the village, and rarely earned their keep. Apostasy increased.
As membership declined, the Shakers began closing communities and consolidating Believers into the remaining villages. Pleasant Hill, which had once had almost five hundred members, dwindled away. By 1875, despite an influx of new proselytes from Sweden , it had fewer than half that number. In 1900, only 34 remained. The Pleasant Hill Shaker community was dissolved in 1910.
Its last surviving Believer was Mary Settles (1836-1923). She was pleased to live long enough to see women's
suffrage
Suffrage, political franchise, or simply franchise, is the right to vote in representative democracy, public, political elections and referendums (although the term is sometimes used for any right to vote). In some languages, and occasionally i ...
and planned to vote a straight Democratic ticket on her first ballot. She said that Shaker sisters had always had
equal rights within their
communal society
An intentional community is a voluntary residential community which is designed to have a high degree of social cohesion and teamwork from the start. The members of an intentional community typically hold a common social, political, religious, ...
.
["Says Suffrage a Shaker Doctrine," ''Lexington Herald'', October 8, 1920, p. 20.]
Life at Pleasant Hill
![Shakertown Craftsman Boxes 2005-05-27](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/27/Shakertown_Craftsman_Boxes_2005-05-27.jpeg)
Many visitors to Pleasant Hill, observing the nineteenth-century architecture, crafts, and clothing, mistakenly assume that the Shakers, like the
Amish
The Amish (; pdc, Amisch; german: link=no, Amische), formally the Old Order Amish, are a group of traditionalist Anabaptist Christian church fellowships with Swiss German and Alsatian origins. They are closely related to Mennonite churches ...
, rejected technological advancements. In fact, the Shakers were
inventors
An invention is a unique or novel device, method, composition, idea or process. An invention may be an improvement upon a machine, product, or process for increasing efficiency or lowering cost. It may also be an entirely new concept. If an ...
or
early adopters
An early adopter or lighthouse customer is an early customer of a given company, product, or technology. The term originates from Everett M. Rogers' ''Diffusion of Innovations'' (1962).
History
Typically, early adopters are customers who, in addi ...
of many new tools and techniques. For example, in the early 1830s the Shakers of Pleasant Hill constructed a
water tower
A water tower is an elevated structure supporting a water tank constructed at a height sufficient to pressurize a water distribution system, distribution system for potable water, and to provide emergency storage for fire protection. Water towe ...
on a high plot of ground. A
horse
The horse (''Equus ferus caballus'') is a domesticated, one-toed, hoofed mammal. It belongs to the taxonomic family Equidae and is one of two extant subspecies of ''Equus ferus''. The horse has evolved over the past 45 to 55 million y ...
-drawn pump lifted water into the tower, and from there a system of pipes conveyed it to the kitchens, cellars, and wash houses. It is believed to have been the first in the state. In the wash houses, the members built
washing machine
A washing machine (laundry machine, clothes washer, washer, or simply wash) is a home appliance used to wash laundry. The term is mostly applied to machines that use water as opposed to dry cleaning (which uses alternative cleaning fluids and ...
s (also powered by horses) to reduce the heavy work of
laundering the community's clothes and linens.
Music was an important part of Shaker life, with the community performing songs, hymns and anthems written by both men and women. One of the best known songs is "Gentle Words", written by Polly M. Rupe in the 1860s. It includes a quote from the Bible ().
Preservation effort
Following the dissolution of the Shaker society in 1910, the property changed hands several times and was used for a variety of purposes. Elderly Shakers continued to live on the property until the death in 1923 of Mary Settles, the last Pleasant Hill Believer.
The Meeting House was converted for use as an
automotive garage; the wood floor, built to withstand the dancing of several hundred brethren and sisters, proved strong enough to support the vehicles driven onto its surface. Some years later the structure was again converted, this time for use as a
Baptist
Baptists form a major branch of Protestantism distinguished by baptizing professing Christian believers only (believer's baptism), and doing so by complete immersion. Baptist churches also generally subscribe to the doctrines of soul compete ...
church.
Following
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
, residents in the region took a renewed interest in the crumbling village of Pleasant Hill. An admirer was the writer
Thomas Merton
Thomas Merton (January 31, 1915 – December 10, 1968) was an American Trappist monk, writer, theologian, mystic, poet, social activist and scholar of comparative religion. On May 26, 1949, he was ordained to the Catholic priesthood and giv ...
, a
Trappist
The Trappists, officially known as the Order of Cistercians of the Strict Observance ( la, Ordo Cisterciensis Strictioris Observantiae, abbreviated as OCSO) and originally named the Order of Reformed Cistercians of Our Lady of La Trappe, are a ...
monk at the nearby
Abbey of Gethsemani
The Abbey of Our Lady of Gethsemani is a Catholic monastery in the United States near Bardstown, Kentucky, in Nelson County. The abbey is part of the Order of Cistercians of the Strict Observance (''Ordo Cisterciensis Strictioris Observantiae''), ...
. Having mentioned Pleasant Hill in his writings as early as 1949, Merton took considerable interest in the community from his first visit there in 1959 until his death in 1968. Describing his first look inside the Trustee's Office in 1959, Merton wrote in his journal to describe:
e marvelous double winding stair going up to the mysterious clarity of a dome on the roof ... quiet sunlight filtering in—a big Lebanon cedar outside one of the windows ... All the other houses are locked up. There is Shaker furniture only in the center family house. I tried to get in it and a gloomy old man living in the back told me curtly 'it was locked up.' The empty fields, the big trees—how I would love to explore those houses and listen to that silence. In spite of the general decay and despair there is joy there still and simplicity ... Shakers fascinate me.
Others shared his interest. In 1961, a group of
Lexington-area citizens led by Joseph Graves and Earl D. Wallace launched an effort to restore the property. By 1964 the Friends of Pleasant Hill had organized a
non-profit corporation
A nonprofit corporation is any legal entity which has been Incorporation (business), incorporated under the law of its jurisdiction for purposes other than making profits for its owners or shareholders. Depending on the laws of the jurisdiction, a ...
, raised funds for operating expenses, and secured a $2 million
federal
Federal or foederal (archaic) may refer to:
Politics
General
*Federal monarchy, a federation of monarchies
*Federation, or ''Federal state'' (federal system), a type of government characterized by both a central (federal) government and states or ...
loan to purchase and restore the site. James Lowry Cogar, a former
Woodford County resident and first curator of
Colonial Williamsburg
Colonial Williamsburg is a living-history museum and private foundation presenting a part of the historic district in the city of Williamsburg, Virginia, United States. The Colonial Williamsburg Foundation has 7300 employees at this location and ...
, was recruited to oversee the complex preservation project.
Today, with 34 original 19th-century buildings and 2,800 acres (1100 hectares) of farmland, Shaker Village of Pleasant Hill claims to be "the largest historic community of its kind in America."
Gallery
File:Shaker-Construction.jpg, Shaker Construction detail, Shaker Village, Pleasant Hill, KY
File:Shaker-Construction2.jpg, Shaker Construction, Shaker Village, Pleasant Hill, KY
File:Shaker-Meeting-House3.jpg, Shaker Furniture, Shaker Village, Meeting House, Pleasant Hill, KY
File:Shaker-Centre-Family-Dwelling,-Interior3.jpg, Shaker Furniture, Shaker Village, Centre Family Dwelling, Pleasant Hill, KY
File:Shaker-Centre-Family-Dwelling,-Interior2.jpg, Shaker Furniture, Shaker Village, Centre Family Dwelling, Pleasant Hill, KY
File:Shaker-Centre-Family-Dwelling,-Interior.jpg, Shaker interior, Shaker Village, Centre Family Dwelling, Pleasant Hill, KY
File:Shaker-Tables.jpg, Shaker Tables, Shaker Village, Pleasant Hill, KY
File:Shaker-Furniture.jpg, Shaker Furniture, Shaker Village, Pleasant Hill, KY
File:Shaker-Tool-Bench.jpg, Shaker Tool Bench, Shaker Village, Pleasant Hill, KY
File:Shaker-Containers3.jpg, Shaker Containers, Shaker Village, Pleasant Hill, KY
File:Shaker-Containers2.jpg, Shaker Containers, Shaker Village, Pleasant Hill, KY
File:Shaker-Containers.jpg, Shaker containers, Shaker Village, Pleasant Hill, KY
File:Shaker-Baskets.jpg, Shaker Baskets, Shaker Village, Pleasant Hill, KY
File:Shaker-Window-Detail.jpg, Shaker Window Detail, Shaker Village, Pleasant Hill, KY
File:Shaker-Wagon-Wheel.jpg, Shaker Wagon Wheel Detail, Shaker Village, Pleasant Hill, KY
See also
*
Shakers
The United Society of Believers in Christ's Second Appearing, more commonly known as the Shakers, are a Millenarianism, millenarian Restorationism, restorationist Christianity, Christian sect founded in England and then organized in the Unit ...
*
Shaker Museum at South Union, Kentucky
*
Lucy Wright
Lucy Wright (February 5, 1760 – 1821) was the leader of the United Society of Believers in Christ’s Second Appearing, also known as the Shakers, from 1796 until 1821. At that time, a woman's leadership of a religious sect was a radical departur ...
*
Isaac N. Youngs Isaac Newton Youngs (July 4, 1793 – August 7, 1865) was a member of the Shakers. He was a prolific scribe, correspondent, and diarist who documented the history of the New Lebanon, New York Church Family of Shakers from 1815 to 1865.
Early li ...
*
Canterbury Shaker Village
Canterbury Shaker Village is a historic site and museum in Canterbury, New Hampshire, United States. It was one of a number of Shaker communities founded in the 19th century.
It is one of the most intact and authentic surviving Shaker communit ...
, New Hampshire
*
Enfield Shaker Museum
The Enfield Shaker Museum is an outdoor history museum and historic district in Enfield, New Hampshire in the United States. It is dedicated to preserving and sharing the history of the Shakers, a Protestant religious denomination, who lived on ...
, New Hampshire
*
Hancock Shaker Village
Hancock Shaker Village is a former Shaker commune in Hancock and Pittsfield, Massachusetts. It emerged in the towns of Hancock, Pittsfield, and Richmond in the 1780s, organized in 1790, and was active until 1960. It was the third of nineteen majo ...
, Massachusetts
*
Mount Lebanon Shaker Society
Mount Lebanon Shaker Society, also known as New Lebanon Shaker Society, was a communal settlement of Shakers in New Lebanon, New York. The earliest converts began to "gather in" at that location in 1782 and built their first meetinghouse in 1785. ...
, New York
*
Fruitlands, Massachusetts
*
Open-air museum
An open-air museum (or open air museum) is a museum that exhibits collections of buildings and artifacts out-of-doors. It is also frequently known as a museum of buildings or a folk museum.
Definition
Open air is “the unconfined atmosphere†...
*
Shaker Seed Company
The Shaker Seed Company was an American seed company that was owned and operated by the Shakers in the eighteenth and nineteenth century. In the latter part of the eighteenth century, many Shaker communities produced several vegetable seed variet ...
References
External links
Shaker Village of Pleasant Hill (Official site)Shaker Village of Pleasant Hill at American Byways
Further reading
* Clark, Thomas D. and F. Gerald Ham. ''Pleasant Hill and Its Shakers'', 2nd edition.
Harrodsburg, Kentucky
Harrodsburg is a home rule-class city in Mercer County, Kentucky, United States. It is the seat of its county. The population was 9,064 at the 2020 census.
Although Harrodsburg was formally established by the House of Burgesses after Boonesbo ...
: Pleasant Hill Press, 1968, 1983.
* Hall, Roger L. ''Give Good Gifts'' - Shaker Music in the 20th Century'',
Stoughton, Massachusetts
Stoughton (official name: Town of Stoughton) is a town in Norfolk County, Massachusetts, United States. The population was 29,281 at the 2020 census. The town is located approximately from Boston, from Providence, Rhode Island, and from Cape ...
, PineTree Press, 2015.
* Ham, F. Gerald. "Pleasant Hill - A Century of Kentucky Shakerism 1805-1910." Thesis. Lexington, KY: University of Kentucky. 1955
* Kelly, Andrew. "Kentucky by Design: The Decorative Arts and American Culture". Lexington, Kentucky, University Press of Kentucky, 2015.
* Lancaster, Clay. ''Pleasant Hill: Shaker Canaan in Kentucky, an Architectural and Social Study.'' Warwick Publications. 2001.
* Marsich, David. "'And Shall thy Flowers Cease to Bloom?': The Shakers' Struggle to Preserve Pleasant Hill, 1862-1910," ''Register of the Kentucky Historical Society'' Volume 109, Nos. 1, Winter 2011 pp. 3–2
in Project MUSE*
Thomas Merton
Thomas Merton (January 31, 1915 – December 10, 1968) was an American Trappist monk, writer, theologian, mystic, poet, social activist and scholar of comparative religion. On May 26, 1949, he was ordained to the Catholic priesthood and giv ...
and Paul M. Pearson, editor. ''Seeking Paradise: The Spirit of the Shakers.'' Maryknoll, New York: Orbis Books, 2003. .
* Neal, Julia, "The Kentucky Shakers." Lexington, KY: University Press of Kentucky. 1977.
* Rhorer, Marc A. "Believers in Dixie: A Cultural Geography of the Kentucky Shakers." Dissertation. Boca Raton, FL: Florida Atlantic University. 2007.
* Rhorer, Marc A. "The Rise and Fall of Mother's Southwestern Branch: A Socio-demographic Study of the Shaker Community at Pleasant Hill, Kentucky 1805-1910." Thesis. Lexington, KY: University of Kentucky. 1996.
* Stein, Stephen J. ''Letters from a Young Shaker: William S. Byrd at Pleasant Hill'' (Lexington, Ky.: University Press of Kentucky, c1985, repr. 2004)
* Stein, Stephen J. ''The Shaker Experience in America'' (Yale University Press, 1992)
Audio
* Hall, Roger. "Love is Little: A Sampling of Shaker Spirituals." Rochester, NY: Sampler Records Ltd., 1996.
{{National Register of Historic Places in Kentucky
National Historic Landmarks in Kentucky
Properties of religious function on the National Register of Historic Places in Kentucky
Shaker communities or museums
Living museums in Kentucky
Museums in Mercer County, Kentucky
Religious museums in Kentucky
Historic districts on the National Register of Historic Places in Kentucky
Populated places established in 1805
1805 establishments in Kentucky
National Register of Historic Places in Mercer County, Kentucky