The La Réunion Experiment

La Réu­nion was a social­ist Utopian com­mu­nity founded in 1855 by French, Bel­gian, and Swiss colonists approx­i­mately three miles west of the present Reunion Arena and Reunion Tower in down­town Dal­las, and near the forks of the Trin­ity River. The com­mune was led by the French philoso­pher Fran­cois Marie Charles Fourier whose fol­low­ers and asso­ciates estab­lished over 40 sim­i­lar colonies in var­i­ous parts of the United States of Amer­ica dur­ing the 1800s.

Inspired by the writ­ings of the French philoso­pher Fran­cois Marie Charles Fourier, the colony was intended to become a social­ist Utopian con­clave bas­ing itself on the idea of com­mu­nal pro­duc­tion and dis­tri­b­u­tion for the ben­e­fit of all. Unlike true com­mu­nist sys­tems indi­vid­u­als could own pri­vate property.

Built on a 2,000 acre pur­chase, La Réu­nion had prob­lems almost from the very begin­ning. The colonists, none of them farm­ers, planned to sup­port the colony, mis­guid­edly, through farm­ing, mainly wheat and veg­eta­bles. Mix in a large group of watch­mak­ers, weavers, brew­ers and store­keep­ers and sud­denly there was a large por­tion of the colony that didn”t have the fog­gi­est idea on how to sur­vive in the Texas landscape.

But they stuck it out and suc­ceeded at grow­ing some wheat and veg­eta­bles, although not enough to sus­tain the colonists. Throw in a bliz­zard in 1856 which destroyed all of their crops and the blaz­ing Texas sum­mer heat and it”s lit­tle won­der why they failed to take hold.

With over 350 colonists even­tu­ally made La Réu­nion their home, the com­mune was already begin­ning to fail as its pop­u­la­tion began to leave the area. Some returned to their native Europe while oth­ers just moved out away. In 1860 the grow­ing town of Dal­las incor­po­rated the La Réu­nion colony into its own land area and absorbed the skills of the remain­ing colonists into its gen­eral population.

Lit­tle of the exper­i­ment is left today, mainly an odd reminder here and there. The most rec­og­niz­able reminder of the colony was a tower built in 1978 which was named Reunion Tower as an eso­teric honor to the colonists who have become a lit­tle less than foot­notes in Dal­las history.