Hippie capitalism keeps Tennessee commune up

SUMMERTOWN, Tenn. -- Three decades after the golden age of the hippie, about 200 of them are still thriving in a self-supporting commune some three hours east of glitzy Graceland.

Known simply as The Farm, the sprawling collective operates, among other things, a midwife service, a soy products company, a mushroom grower and a factory producing personal radiation detectors.

Established on a 1,800-acre site in 1971, The Farm has outlived nearly all of its tie-dyed contemporaries with a mix of entrepreneurship, idealism, and a touch of sweat.

"We were hippies wanting to live together, and we accepted the discipline it took to do that," said Stephen Gaskin, the founder of the commune.

Gaskin, now 68, was teaching in San Francisco when in 1966 he began holding meetings every Monday night on "what was happening outside his window," according The Farm's history posted on its Web site.

The crowds grew, so Gaskin took the gatherings on the road, attracting a throng of followers. The caravan of about 1,500 bought some land in the Lewis County hills and The Farm was formed.

'The changeover'

The early days, which Gaskin says were guided by agreements "looser than handshakes," made it though tough times. Some bad investments and an equally poor national economy in the late '70s put The Farm about $400,000 in debt, says Douglas Stevenson, a Farm resident since 1973.

What resulted was "the changeover" in 1983, which Stevenson described as the decision to make "every adult responsible for bringing in some cash."

Except for their casual jeans and T-shirts, these graying men in their 50s don't look or act much like the stereotypical, free-spirit hippies. They live with other residents in modest homes spread liberally across the vast fields and forests of the commune property, and they talk wistfully about how they once took their children to play Little League games in nearby Lawrenceburg.

People here may live under a different system than others, Stevenson says, but nobody came here "trying to escape from anything."

"Our real objective is communication," Schweitzer adds. "We support ourselves by doing little jobs."

When it comes to money, The Farm's handle on the books is less exacting than at most businesses. Leaders say they don't know what the commune's overall annual income is.

Honoring free enterprise

But SE International, the personal radiation detector factory which Farm residents say is the commune's most profitable business, had revenues of $2.1 million for the most recent fiscal year.

Book publishing was The Farm's original business, and remains collectively owned.

Warren Jefferson, who came to The Farm on the original caravan and works at the publishing company, says he doesn't think The Farm has turned its back on its hippie roots to become a capitalist tool.

Instead, he says, The Farm "honors" free enterprise and hasn't compromised the original "right livelihood" ideals, such as helping mankind by excelling at a task.

Gaskin also doesn't see any compromise in The Farm's success, but can't help but notice the inescapable change in the residents who came here 30 years ago to rebel against their parents and society.

"Now," he says, "we have become the grown-ups."