Publications

American Communal Societies Series, no. 17. 260 pages, 2024
ISBN: 978-1937370411 ($30)

Who was Dr. Alesha Sivartha, the visionary artist whose strange inscribed mind maps, occult diagrams, and painstaking anatomical drawings were printed in a variety of obscure books and pamphlets in the late nineteenth century?
Religious historian John Buescher here draws Dr. Sivartha out of mysterious obscurity and traces the story of his wild life, from his birth as Elisha Holmes Dodge in upstate New York in 1834, to his transformation, under the name of Arthur E. Merton, into a phrenologist, free-lover, utopian socialist, and cult leader. At the time of his death in 1915, he had assumed the name of Alesha Sivartha, and transformed himself into an occult documentarian who sought to map the structures of the “New Jerusalem” onto the biological and chemical world. This richly illustrated volume includes an extensive album of Sivartha’s drawings.

Dr. John B. Buescher is the author of books and articles on the history of nineteenth-century American Spiritualism. He is a co-director of the International Association for the Preservation of Spiritualist and Occult Periodicals (IAPSOP).

• From the Editor
• How Father Joseph Emerged as the Leader of the Shakers: A Closer Look at the 1780s and Beyond by Stephen Paterwic
• “Fall on the rock”: Excavating a Shaker Spiritual Motif by Carol Medlicott
• “The Picturesque Shakers” and “Hands to Work: Picturing the Shakers as Handicraft Workers in 19th Century Photographs” by Robert P. Emlen
• The Grand Survivor: The Harvard Shakers’ New Office of 1839–40 213 by Ned Quist

Front cover illustration: “J. W.” Stone. Photo by Winthrop B. Coffin, The Peg Board, 1936. Back cover illustration: The grave marker of Sarah Wright Meacham, mother of Father Joseph Meacham. Photo by author.

• From the Editor
• The Rise of Anti-Masonry in Western New York and Its Connection to the Rise of Mormonism by Bruce A. Van Orden
• “There’s no combination, so firm as freemason”: William Wines Phelps — New York Journalist, Mason, and Anti-Mason by Michael W. Homer
• A “Prophet to Your Father”: Martin Harris and the Printing of the Book of Mormon by Rick Grunder
• The Key to William Morgan’s Jail Cell in Canandaigua, New York by Christian Goodwillie

Front cover illustration: The original copyright title page for the Book of Mormon filed June 11, 1829. Courtesy of the Library of Congress. Back cover illustration: Rick Grunder photographing the key to William Morgan’s cell at St. Patrick’s Lodge, No. 4, Johnstown, New York, June 22, 2023. Photograph by Christian Goodwillie.

Shaker Studies, no 19, 339 pages, 2024.
ISBN: 978-1-937370-40-4 ($35)

This study—the first of of its kind— is a comprehensive examination of one of the most fascinating and colorful periods of American religious history: the Shakers’ Era of Manifestations. Based on a comprehensive reading of primary sources from Shaker communities in Ohio and Kentucky, this volume documents the spiritual highs and lows promulgated by Shaker visionists (spirit mediums) as their gifts impacted their communities in a variety of ways —both positive and negative. Visits from Mother Ann Lee, Holy Mother Wisdom, the Eternal Father, and the Holy Savior (Jesus) are detailed herein, as well as the establishment of outdoor worship sites—Feast Grounds—the reception of gift songs, new dances, and most intriguing of all, interactions with the departed of many races and nations, including an exceptional series of encounters with Indigenous American (Indian) spirits, historical figures like George Washington, and many Shaker founders.

Thomas Sakmyster is an emeritus professor at the University of Cincinnati, where he was the Walter Langsam Professor of Modern European History. He has published widely on his areas of specialization, including modern East European history, the American Communist Party, world communism, and Shaker history. He is co-editor of The Shakers of White Water, 1823-1916 and author of The Last Shaker Apostate: Augustus Wager and Union Village, Ohio and articles on various themes in the history of the Shakers.

• From the Editor
• Johann Adam Gruber – His Life and Times by Emilie Hoppe
• Thoughts on Barbara Heinemann Landmann by Janet W. Zuber
• Places to Pray: A Survey of Inspirationist Meeting Houses by Peter Hoehnle
• Book Production in Communal Ebenezer, New York, and Amana, Iowa by Lanny Haldy
• A Question of Pacifism or Patriotism: The Amana Society during World War I by Jon Childers

Front cover illustration: The author’s [Lanny Haldy] grandmother’s Bücherschrank (book cabinet) containing most of the over 300 Inspirationist imprints. Photo by Lanny Haldy. Back cover illustration: Ronneburg, 2023. Photo by Reiner Erdt.

• From the Editor
• “This imperfect scrawl”: Neighbor Maria G. Ham Remembers the Canterbury Shakers, 1839-1908 by Brian D. Carroll
• Frederick Williams Evans’s Letter to Alcander Longley in the Phalansterian Record by Christian Goodwillie
• Defending the House of David: Mary Purnell’s 1923 Testimony before a Michigan Grand Jury by Brian D. Carroll
• Kaliflower: A Selection of Covers

Front and back cover illustrations: Kaliflower

• From the Editor
• Canterbury’s Shaker Museum: Curating the Past During Times of Change and Crisis by Becky Soules
• Holes in the Fabric of a Shaker Village: Three Lost Buildings of the Harvard Shaker Society by Ned Quist
• “For the benefit of Believers only”: The Remarkable Odyssey of Thirty Medical Receipts by Kerry Hackett

Front cover illustration: Only known photograph of the museum in situ in the Brethren’s South Shop (ca. 1877–1917). (Communal Societies Collection, Hamilton College)
Back cover illustration: William Wright: North Family Dwelling, 1896. (Courtesy of the Trustees Archives and Research Center)

American Communal Societies Series, no. 16. 154 pages with illustrations, 2030
ISBN: 978-1-937370-37-4 ($35)

Description:
Redware was the first locally made pottery made during the early years of Euro-American expansion across North America. Utilizing methods and stylistic conventions brought from Europe, redware potters made a variety of household wares such as pitchers, storage jars, jugs, plates, and mugs. Christoph Weber was the master potter of the Harmony Society, a German utopian group founded by religious dissenter Georg Rapp. Working from ca. 1808 to 1853, Weber’s pottery was distributed among the Society’s members and sold to their neighbors. Utilizing documentary sources, archaeological investigations, and analysis of surviving ceramics, this volume paints a detailed picture of Christoph Weber, the different types of pottery he manufactured, and his place in the early nineteenth century origins of the ceramics industry in the United States.

Michael Strezewski is an Associate Professor of Anthropology at the University of Southern Indiana. Dr. Strezewski has directed archaeological excavations in New Harmony since 2008, publishing numerous reports and articles on the Harmony Society.

Four volumes, 2023.
ISBN: 978-1-937370-35-0 ($150 plus $20 shipping)

The Shakers: A Bibliography comprises more than 17,500 entries for printed materials by and about the United Society of Believers in Christ’s Second Appearing, more commonly called Shakers. This work more than quadruples the number of entries contained in Mary Richmond’s Shaker Literature (1977), the standard bibliography on the Shakers until now. The product of fifteen years of painstaking research by a team of bibliographers, The Shakers: A Bibliography comprehensively documents the written record of this remarkably influential communal Christian sect. Each entry provides publication information, annotation and commentary, and holdings information. Additionally, brief biographies are provided for a number of Shaker authors. The Shakers: A Bibliography provides scholars with a tremendous amount of new source material and information to undergird future research and writing about the United Society.

American Communal Societies Series, no. 15. 100 pages with illustrations, 2030
ISBN: 978-1-937370-36-7 ($20)

Description:
German Socialist Wilhelm Weitling visited eight American intentional communities during 1851-1852. He published accounts of these visits in his newspaper, Die Republik der Arbeiter. These accounts have been almost entirely unknown to scholars, until now. This volume contains Joscelyn Godwin’s translations; introduced, annotated, and illustrated by Peter Hoehnle, bringing Weitling’s descriptions of his communal odyssey to students of American communal societies who cannot read German. Communities visited include: the Shakers at Watervliet, New York; the Community of True Inspiration at Eben-Ezer, New York; the Society of Separatists at Zoar, Ohio; Communia, Iowa; the Icarian Community at Nauvoo, Illinois; Bishop Hill Colony, Illinois; the Harmony Society at Economy, Pennsylvania; and Bethel, Missouri.