United Order Industries

For twelve years Orderville tried to make everything itself. Founded in 1874 as a United Order — a full communal economy — the town built an astonishing spread of workshops to supply its own needs: a bakery and common dining hall, a carpenter shop, blacksmith, and shoe shop, a tannery, gristmill, sawmill, and molasses mill, a bucket factory, and mills for both wool and cotton. It kept sheep and cattle, raised silk, made brooms and hats. Few frontier towns ever produced so broadly under one roof. The cooperative dissolved in 1886.

What the plaque says

On March 20, 1874, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints organized a modern Order of Enoch, called the United Order, Israel Hoyt, first president. A community dining hall with bakery was constructed, also a garden house for seeds and tools. They built a carpenter, blacksmith and shoe shop, tannery, gristmill, sawmill, molasses mill, bucket factory, a woolen and cotton factory; engaged in the silk industry, dairying, broom and hat making. The people planted farms, orchards and gardens, raised sheep and cattle. The cooperative ended in 1886.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Mount Carmel Junction — 4.1 mi
  The crossroads where the road to Zion meets the highway to Bryce
• Checkerboard Mesa — 14 mi
  A 900-foot dome of Navajo sandstone scored into a natural grid, near Zion's east entrance
• Best Friends Animal Sanctuary — 16 mi
  The largest no-kill animal sanctuary in the United States
• Kanab — 17 mi
  Little Hollywood — where hundreds of Western movies were filmed

More markers nearby

• Orderville Bell — steps away
• Old Rock Schoolhouse — steps away
• Orderville Cemetery — 0.3 mi
• Mt. Carmel School & Church — 2.5 mi