COMFORTABLE SHAKER HOME:
BEING A SHAKER

 

Shortly before joining the community in 1830, Frederick Evans wrote that the Mount

Lebanon Shakers told him, “Salvation is to be happy here, and when you are happy, you are in heaven.” Although the volume of laws and rules produced by the Ministry attest to the effort necessary, Shakers intended life in their communities to be heaven on earth and the achievement of perfection. One brother told journalist Charles Nordhoff in 1875, “Here I found my place and my work, and have been happy and content, seeing the realization of

the highest I had dreamed of.”

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