jon - Our community was not so formal as to have a name or designated ideology. The early 70s were full of societal change and we were part of that. I had been a brother in the Marianist, Catholic teaching order through college engaged in Peace through social justice, ethical war resistance, urban poor empowerment, right technology in the developing world . . . and so forth. I then married and had a child, but wanted to continue a collective enterprise, and opened my doors to a group which included my brother Jim, and a few mutual friends. We bought land on the Cumberland Plateau to form a sustainable living enterprise and needed a shared employment project, which became Thiel Audio. Of course this sketch is the bare bones synopsis.
From the beginning we shared all funds, responsibilities and development of common direction. Religion or traditional belief was not a part of our commune; the experiment was social, not spiritual. Its end was more of a mutation than anything else. By the mid 90s, it was clear that my focus of creating a "good place for good people to earn a good living doing good work for the good of all" was no longer appreciated as a driving force. Rather, the survival needs of the business were what consumed everyone's around the clock attention. It took me 5 years to objectify the manufacturing systems and personnel enough that I could leave without damaging the enterprise. Its growth and development continued. I am proud of that.
