Copyright USGenNet Inc., 2013, All Rights Reserved U.S. Data Repository Please read U.S. Data Repository Copyright Statement on this page: Transcribed and submitted by Linda Talbott for the US Data Repository http://www.us-data.org/ ========================================================================= U.S. Data Repository NOTICE: These electronic pages may NOT be reproduced in any format for profit or presentation by any other organization. Non-commercial organizations desiring to use this material must obtain the consent of the transcriber prior to use. Individuals desiring to use this material in their own research may do so. ========================================================================= Formatted by U.S. Data Repository Chief Archivist, Linda Talbott All of the above information must remain when copied or downloaded. =========================================================================== PIONEER HISTORY OF HURON COUNTY, MICHIGAN by Florence McKinnon Gwinn Huron County Pioneer & Historical Society, 1922 [page 51] CHAPTER III EARLY TOWNSHIP HISTORY A COMMUNITY EXPERIMENT Among the vanished villages of Huron County is that of Ora Labora, a colony situated between Caseville [page 52] PIONEER HISTORY OF HURON COUNTY and Wild Fowl Bay (now Bay Port) which was modeled after the famous German society at New Harmony, Penn. The property was held in common but each settler had a piece of ground in his own right. They had several thousand acres of land, bought from the government in 1857-8. The heavy timbered country and the swampy nature of much of the land required a large amount of ditching to render it valuable for cultivation and the re- moteness from any existing village, at that time Bay City was the nearest trading point, rendered the making of the colony an extremely difficult task. Their hard- ships were unusually severe. The purchase had com- pletely exhausted their money. Fever and ague abound- ed and aggravated all of their other ills and the wonder is that the colonists struggled as long and bravely as they did against the odds they encountered. Then the war came on and in its latter stages sent its drafting sum- mons into their ranks. Too poor to procure substitutes and too honest to run away as many of their neighbors did, thus increasing the burdens which fell upon them (as the county had to furnish its quota) their ranks were depleted until the women and old men were almost left alone to carry on the farming operations. The load was greater than they could bear and Ora Labora was broken up. In 1865 the editor of the Huron County News visited the colony and gives this vivid picture of it in that day: "While on a trip up the shore we improved the oppor- tunity of visiting our friend Mr. EMIL BAUR, a pastor and one of the founders of the society which at the present time numbers 140 souls of which 28 are heads of families, 10 single men, five young ladies, 28 wives, 73 children under 14 years of age and 36 voters. The society has purchased about 3,000 acres and contracted with the state for 10,000 more. They have 160 acres cleared and under cultivation. Have built a saw and grist mill making their bread stuffs from grain of their own pro- duction and also manufacturing all kinds of lumber both for their own use and exportation. A dock has been built extending several hundred feet into the bay. The so- ciety also owns one of the islands in Wilf Fowl Bay [page 53] PIONEER HISTORY OF HURON COUNTY containing 180 acres on which they plan to raise grapes. The village of Ora Labora is regularly laid out in squares with wide streets and the colonists have adopted a good old custom of the fatherland adorning the streets with fruit trees. Each newcomer, we understand, is given 40 acres of land." After the disbandment of the colony we find this statement about the colonists in a Detroit paper of 1871. "The colonists of Ora Labora while they did not succeed as a community did much permanent and really valuable work for that section of the county, and the case being presented to the legislature homesteads of 80 and 40 acres according to service rendered were granted them by the state under proper restrictions and a goodly num- ber of the hardy and faithful band are still to be found living on their own farms, well cleaned up and finely tilled and gradually emerging into a condition of in- dependence and comfort hardily earned and richly de- served." The remaining lands and buildings became the property of the Harmony Colony of Economy, Penn., who held a mortgage on it. A few of the old buildings remain to mark the site of this once populous village. BERT BAUR, of Bay Port, is the son of EMIL BAUR, once so prominent in the affairs of the colony. ===========================================================================