Jane Owen wrote about one aspect of her life specifically: all that led to and radiated from her New Harmony experiences, from her arrival in 1941 through the early 1970s. A literal chronology was less important to her as an organizing principle than sequences created spontaneously through natural associations and connections. She borrowed a comparison about her writing style from a well-worn phrase about the difference in one’s religious orientation: following the spirit rather than the letter of the law. Like her oral storytelling, her written narrative flows freely, often jumping from present to past or future; it reminds me of the path of the Cathedral Labyrinth she would walk in New Harmony, which led, albeit circuitously, to the center before retracing the path outward again. While on the current path, the feet attempt to balance between the one just walked and the one yet to come, manifesting in each step on its smooth granite surface the fluid interplay of present, past, and future. Such is the nature of writing from hindsight.
As part of the revising process, which began in early 2009, she and I consulted a wide array of resources, both her own and archival material, including correspondence, journals, and her previous publications, such as forewords and presentation papers. We endeavored to support the narrative while also remaining true to the memory. For Jane Owen, the primary purpose of her writing would be to tell the personal story. She would leave to scholars the task of interpreting her legacy.
Chartres Labyrinth Image.
© Jeff Saward, Labyrinthos Photo Archive. Courtesy of Jeff Saward/Labyrinthos.
NEW HARMONY
INDIANA
JANE BLAFFER OWEN
My life is for myself and not for spectacle. I much prefer that it be of a lower strain, so it be genuine and equal, than that it should be glittering and unsteady. . . . To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment.
—Ralph Waldo Emerson, “Self-Reliance”
CHAPTER 1
Twin Vows
I grew up in a small, exclusive neighborhood of impressive homes with magnolia-, jasmine-, and rose-filled gardens. The several families who had built these fine homes and gardens owned stock in the same companies, belonged to the same clubs, sent their children to the same schools, and attended the same church (institutions that were segregated in those days). The presumption that long and enduring friendships would blossom among the beneficiaries of this elite segment of society was in my case never justified.
In the decades between two world wars, children—especially young women—seldom disappointed parental expectations, however often they might have wished to bolt imposed boundaries. My long-suppressed rebellious spirit came close to volcanic eruption in Houston during 1936, my first year after college. Well-intentioned and loyal friends of my parents gave endless lunches, dinners, and dances, for I was considered a proper debutante in my Parisian haute couture wardrobe. Not so. I had done nothing to merit the attention of kind hosts. I saw myself as a wild, alien creature who had been forcefully herded down from her native habitat into a glittering show ring and ordered to go through prescribed paces. I searched in vain for some loose planks in my imaginary enclosure but found none.
Nor was there an acceptable exit from societal expectations after my engagement to Kenneth Dale Owen, the estimable man who would be my husband for sixty-one years. My future role as an active member of Houston society and a promoter of good causes cast its long shadow before me. My family background and education together with Kenneth’s own impeccable credentials would place me in a position of leadership in the energy and oil capital of the world. Would I take a bold leap over my enclosure, embarrass the people I loved, break my legs, and smash my foolish face in the doing? Happily, and I believe by the grace of God, I didn’t have to kick over the traces.
A way out of confining expectations presented itself shortly after my marriage in July 1941 and opened the way for a second marriage. From my perspective today, I firmly believe that every first marriage can be preserved if a cerebral and spiritual marriage follows. The rumblings of discontent in our hearts can lead either to strained relationships and divorces or to life-enhancing breakthroughs. It is unwise to expect happiness solely from another person. Other women have saved their marriages by taking a law degree, answering a call to the ministry, or cultivating an undeveloped talent. Had anyone predicted that a sleepy, dusty little Indiana town would be my threshold to a higher consciousness, I would not have believed it. But something did happen in that unlikely place to redirect my life.
That something began with a stopover in New Harmony one hot August day in 1941, three weeks after our wedding at Ste. Anne, my family’s summer place in Ontario. As we were driving from Canada to Texas, Kenneth wanted me to see the town of his birth before pushing on to Houston. I had, of course, consented but not with enthusiasm. I had heard about my husband’s illustrious ancestors and had read Frank Podmore’s life of Robert Owen with my father before I met Kenneth. Daddy admired Owen for his factory and child labor reforms and initiated similar social benefits and an employee stock ownership plan for the Humble Oil Company that he helped found. For me, the legacy of Robert Owen and his fellow passengers on “The Boatload of Knowledge” existed chiefly in history books and biographies.
Blaffer sisters “Titi” (Cecil), Jane, and Joyce.
Blaffer-Owen family photograph.
Mr. and Mrs. Kenneth Dale Owen.
Blaffer-Owen family photograph.
Our car pulled up before an unusual house known as the David Dale Owen Laboratory, which I soon learned had been built in 1859 (4 on town map on back endpaper). David Dale Owen was a geologist.1 David’s elder brother Robert Dale, who was an early trustee of the Smithsonian, had chosen James Renwick Jr. as the architect for that institution, America’s first castle of science and first national museum.
David Dale had worked and taught in three laboratories before building this one: the Harmonist Community House No. 3 and the Harmonist shoe factory (both long gone from town), followed by seventeen years in the Harmonist stone Granary behind the Laboratory (5, 6, and 7 on town map, respectively). Successive generations of non-geologist Owens had converted David’s Laboratory into a family residence, and my husband called it home. I felt more like bowing my head than looking up because I was, in essence, bringing a wreath to the graves of noble men and women. But an alive and unforgettable presence was standing in the doorway to greet us: Kenneth’s elderly aunt Aline Owen Neal.
Auntie’s freshly laundered white cotton dress, full and floor-length, did not conceal or diminish her somewhat triangular shape. A black, curving ear trumpet emerged like a ram’s horn from the left side of her well-coiffed hair but was quickly lowered so both arms could embrace her nephew. Auntie didn’t grasp what we were saying, but no matter: sweetly smiling, she nodded assent to Kenneth’s every word. She had helped raise him. Ever since his first oil well, Kenneth had maintained her as the châtelaine of the Laboratory, a living monument to the Owen family.
I was no sooner inside than, like a stray cat, I wanted out. The twenty-foot-tall living room, designed to be a lecture hall with a gallery on three sides, was not hospitable. Several tables were stacked high with outdated newspapers and greeting cards. Auntie threw nothing away, perhaps because