Excerpt:
New Harmony was established in 1814 by a group of German extraction led by a man named George Rapp. They had moved from a colony named Harmonie in Pennsylvania, and numerous letters written by them from the new Indiana settlement were datelined Harmonie, Ind. It has been reported that Robert Owen changed the name to New Harmony when he acquired it, but a letter of 1815 from George Rapp to his son Frederick was datelined "Neu Harmony" and used the German spelling "Neu" and ended the word "Harmony" with a "y" instead of "ie" (Arndt, 1975, facing p.7). The Harmonists, during their 10 years, made no geologic contribution, but they built a physical base of operations in a wilderness, which their successors probably could not and surely would not have done. When Robert Owen, who was a successful industrialist and progressive thinker in New Lanark, Scotland, sought a site in America to test his ideas for social reform, the ready made community of New Harmony was for sale and was purchased.