AURA

Grand Lake and Aspen are both pretty, fun places. But I think Greeley is also worth a stop, if for no other reason than to pay homage to an idea. I have a soft spot in my heart for Horace Greeley because long before I came along, he had a soft spot in his heart for a communal living experiment in Oneida, New York that had turned out nicely in the mid 1800s. Not all that far from my hometown of Buffalo. His idea was to imitate Oneida in the west and give the unemployed of New York City a new start in life. He used the newspaper he started as a trumpet to get them going. So he sent Nathan Meeker, his agriculture editor at the paper, to set up a Utopian agricultural settlement he called Union Colony, though Meeker decided to name it after Greeley. A nice tribute. Anyway, it’s still agricultural and still going strong, though it’s not any more communal than anything else now in America. But if you go to The Meeker Museum or at least read about it in this note’s links to get the full story, maybe you’ll be inspired.

●Horace Greeley, social reformer

●Union Colony, Meeker's utopian experiment

●Meeker Home / Museum - Intro, Exhibits, Directions, Hours, Tours

●10 day weather forecast