KEY PENINSULA Communities - HOME
Photo and content courtesy of the
Key Peninsula Historical Society
In 1896, the Allen, Verity, and Odell families purchased 26 acres of
land on the northwest side of Von Geldern Cove and called their new
place "Home City." In 1897, the first three families entrusted their
original 26 acres to the newly incorporated "Mutual Home Association."
The Dadisman family added 64 acres in 1899. The association provided two
acre plots for use by newcomers, but retained ownership of the land as a
way to significantly reduce the tax burden of landowners. This
cooperative arrangement frustrated the tax assessors in Tacoma. Working
in the collaborative spirit, early Home families quickly built a
community of houses, stores, social halls, hotels, schools, post office,
telephone exchange, and baseball grandstand. A long tradition of
alternative publications espousing the Home resident's philosophies have
been printed from Home and distributed all over the United States and
parts of the world. Newspapers, books, and public lectures regularly
addressed topics like: freedom of speech, world affairs, workplace
conditions, equal rights, marriage enslavement, women's suffrage, free
love, diet, yoga, music, drama, emancipation, open religion, atheism,
agnosticism, and lifelong learning.
These extremely radical viewpoints put Home on the map as a "colony of
anarchists." When President McKinley was assassinated in 1901 by a
professed anarchist, Tacoma newspapers and churches called for an end to
the Home community. In addition to unavoidable mob violence, Home
suffered through a number of court trials. Lois Waisbrooker, 75 year old
author, and Mattie Penhallow, Home's postmistress, were both indicted
for sending "obscene materials through the mail!" The material in
question was an article on the sexual revolution and Home's new post
office was closed in 1903 as punishment for the whole community. Jay
Fox, newspaper editor, was convicted of inciting "disrespect for the
law" when he wrote about nude bathing. The U.S. Supreme Court turned
down his freedom of speech appeal in 1913. Lastly, the Home Mutual
Association was dissolved by court order in 1921, when the state
government changed the law to make cooperative land holdings illegal.
Plots were then sold back to the residents and Home became like every
other small town on the Key Peninsula.
text by Stella Retherford & Simon Priest