At its peak, the 3,000-acre Shaker village at Pleasant Hill consisted of over 200 structures. Today, the restored village contains 34 restored original Shaker buildings.
This map gives us a bird's-eye view of the structures located in the heart of the village, from Trustee's Office to pigsty, and is reminiscent of the cartography style used by two Shaker men from the New Lebanon community who visited their brethren almost 200 years ago.
The map is found within the pages of Michael Capek's 2001 book "A Personal Tour of a Shaker Village" -- a book for kids in grades 4-7 described by one reviewer as being written "through the eyes of a fictional deacon, former slave, teacher, physician, and visitor to worship, readers learn about daily life, from waking rituals and food preparation to tanning chores, carpentry projects, and the care of silkworms."
What the reviewer is apparently unaware of is that while the account of their daily life is historical fiction, the people that Capek highlights in the book are real:
Benjamin Dunlavy (deacon)
Patsy Roberts Williamson (former slave)
Hortensia Hooser (teacher)
John Shain (physician)
The visitor mentioned in Capek's story had an experience that was likely similar to visitors Rufus Bishop and Isaac Youngs when they traveled through the Western Shaker communities in 1834, recording their observations and mapping fascinating pictorial renderings (in the LOC collection) of all that they saw at that moment in time.
Citation from Library of Congress:
Youngs, Isaac N, and George Kendall. Sketches of the various Societies of Belivers i.e. Believers in the states of Ohio & Kentucky. To which is added a slight sketch of Sodus Bay in the northern part of N. York. Also a map containing several of the states on which is laid out of the route of Bv. Rufus Bishop and Isaac N. Youngs New Lebanon while on a hour to visit these societies, in the summer and fall of. 1835. Map. Retrieved from the Library of Congress, <www.loc.gov/item/2002622454/>.
