ONEIDA, a city of Madison county, New York, U.S.A., on Oneida Creek, about 6 m. S.E. of Oneida Lake, about 26 m. W. of Utica, and about 26 m. E.N.E. of Syracuse. Pop. (1890) 6083; (1900) 6364, of whom 784 were foreign-born; (1910, U.S. census) 8317. It is served by the New York Central & Hudson River, the New York, Ontario & Western, the West Shore and the Oneida (electric) railways (the last connecting with Utica and Syracuse), and by the Erie Canal. The city lies about 440 ft. above the sea on a level site. Across Oneida Creek, to the south-east, in Oneida county, is the village of Oneida Castle (pop. in 1905, 357), situated in the township of Vernon (pop. in 1905, 3072), and the former gathering place of the Oneida Indians, some of whom still live in the township of Vernon and in the city of Oneida. In the south-eastern part of the city is the headquarters of the Oneida Community (q.v.), which controls important industries here, at Niagara Falls, and elsewhere. Immediately west of Oneida is the village of Wampsville (incorporated in 1908), the county-seat of Madison county. Among the manufactures of Oneida are wagons, cigars, furniture, caskets, silver-plated ware, engines and machinery, steel and wooden pulleys and chucks, steel grave vaults, hosiery, and milk bottle caps. In the vicinity the Oneida Community manufactures chains and animal traps. The site of Oneida was purchased in 1829–1830 by Sands Higinbotham, in honour of whom one of the municipal parks (the other is Allen Park) is named. Oneida was incorporated as a village in 1848 and chartered as a city in 1901.
ONEIDA (a corruption of their proper name Oneyotka-ono, " people of the stone," in allusion to the Oneida stone, a granite boulder near their former village, which was held sacred by
them), a tribe of North American Indians of Iroquoian stock, forming one of the Six Nations. They lived around Oneida
Lake in New York state, in the region southward to the
Susquehanna. They were not loyal to the League's policy of
friendliness to the English, but inclined towards the French,
and were practically the only Iroquois who fought for the
Americans in the War of Independence. As a consequence
they were attacked by others of the Iroquois under Joseph
Brant and took refuge within the American settlements till the
war ended, when the majority returned to their former home,
while some migrated to the Thames river district, Ontario.
Early in the 19th century they sold their lands, and most of
them settled on a reservation at Green Bay, Wisconsin, some
few remaining in New York state. The tribe now numbers
more than 3000, of whom about two-thirds are in Wisconsin, a
few hundreds in New York state, and about 800 in Ontario.
They are civilized and prosperous.
ONEIDA COMMUNITY (or Bible Communists), an American
communistic society at Oneida, Madison county. New York, which has attracted wide interest on account of its pecuniary success and its peculiar religious and social principles (see Communism).
Its founder, John Humphrey Noyes (1811-1886), was born in Brattleboro, Vermont, on the 3rd of September 1811. He was of good parentage; his father, John Noyes (1763-1841), was a graduate of and for a time a tutor in Dartmouth College, and was a representative in Congress in 1815-1817; and his mother, Polly Hayes, was an aunt of Rutherford B. Hayes, president of the United States. The son graduated at Dartmouth in 1830, and studied law for a year, but having been converted in a protracted revival in 1831 he turned to the ministry, studied theology for one year at Andover (where he was a member of " The Brethren, " a secret society of students preparing for foreign missionary work), and then a year and a half at Yale, and in 1833 was licensed to preach by the New Haven Association; but his open preaching of his new religious doctrines, and especially that of present salvation from sin, resulted in the revocation of his license in 1834, and his thereafter being called a Perfectionist. He continued to promulgate his ideas of a higher Christian life, and soon had disciples in many places, one of whom, Harriet A. Holton, a woman of means, he married in 1838. In 1836 he returned to his father's home in Putney, Vt., and founded a Bible School; in 1843 he entered into a " contract of Partnership " with his Putney followers; and in March 1845 the Putney Corporation or Association of Perfectionists was formed.
Although the Putney Corporation or Association was never a community in the sense of common-property ownership, yet it was practically a communal organization, and embodied the radical religious and social principles that subsequently gave such fame to the Oneida Community, of which it may justly be regarded as the beginning and precursor. These principles naturally excited the opposition of the churches in the small Vermont village where the Perfectionists resided, and indignation meetings against them were held; and although they resulted in no personal violence Mr Noyes and his followers considered it prudent to remove to a place where they were sure of more liberal treatment. They accordingly withdrew from Putney in 1847, 3-id accepting the invitation of Jonathan Burt and others, settled near Oneida, Madison county, New York.
Here the community at first devoted itself to agriculture and fruit raising, but had little financial success until it began the manufacture of a steel trap, invented by one of its members, Sewall Newhouse; the manufacture of steel chains for use with the traps followed; the canning of vegetables and fruits was begun about 1854, and the manufacture of sewing and embroidery silk in 1866. Having started with a very small capital (the inventoried valuation of its property in 1857 was only $67,000), the community gradually grew in numbers and prospered as a business concern. Its relations with the surrounding population, after the first few years, became very friendly. The members won the reputation of being good, industrious citizens, whose word was always " as good as their bond "; against whom no charge of intemperance, profanity or crime was ever brought. But the communists claimed that among true Christians " mine and thine " in property matters should cease to exist, as among the early pentecostal beUevers; and, moreover, that the same unselfish spirit should pervade and control all human relations. And notwithstanding these very radical principles, which were freely propounded and discussed in their weekly paper, the communists were not seriously disturbed for a quarter of a century. But from 1873 to 1879 active measures favouring legislative action against the community, specially instigated by Prof. John W. Mears (1825-1881), were taken by several ecclesiastical bodies of Central New York. These measures culminated in a conference held at Syracuse University on the 14th of February 1879, when denunciatory resolutions against the community were passed and legal measures advised.
Mr Noyes, the founder and leader of the community, had repeatedly said to his followers that the time might come when it would be necessary, in deference to public opinion, to recede from the practical assertion of their social principles; and on the 20th of August of this year (1879) he said definitely to them that in his judgment that time had come, and he thereupon proposed that the community " give up the practice of Complex Marriage, not as renouncing belief in the principles and prospective finality of that institution, but in deference to public sentiment." This proposition was considered and accepted in full assembly of the community on the 26th of the same month.
This great change was followed by other changes of vital importance, finally resulting in the transformation of the Oneida Community into the incorporated Oneida Community, Limited, a co-operative joint-stock company, in which each person's interest was represented by the shares of stock standing in his name on the books of the company.
In the reorganization the adult members fared alike in the matter of remuneration for past services — those who by reason of ill-health had been unable to contribute to the common fund receiving the same as those who by reason of strength and ability had contributed most thereto; besides, the old and infirm had the option of accepting a life-guaranty in lieu of work; and hence there were no cases of suffering and want at the time the transformation from a common-property interest to an individual stock interest was made; and in the new company all were guaranteed remunerative labour.
