The town of Utopia

Any one who lives along the Ohio river have most likely been through Utopia. Those who haven't have its just so small that they missed it. It may be a small town but it has a strange history.

Started in 1844 by Charles Fourier. He was a member of a religious sect that believed that the earth was entering into a 35,000 year period of peace and that the oceans were going to turn into lemonade (seriously). So he got more than a dozen families to join him in his town he called Utopia. He charged them $25.00 a year and they each were given a wooden house to live in.

In 1846 his town was disbanded after the oceans failed to turn into lemonade. After that the town was sold to John O. Wattles, the leader of a group of spiritualists. Against the warnings of locals, Wattles had the main building moved, brick by brick, down to the water's edge. It was completed by December of 1847, just in time for one of the biggest floods of the nineteenth century.

By December 13th the house and most of its occupants were swept down the Ohio river