Page 12 - C.A.L.L. #38 - Summer 2014
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Tikkun Olam in Camphill by Jan Martin Bang
Camphill Villages, a short history Germany, Holland, Norway, South Africa and
During the 1930s a group of intellectuals the United States. In the early 1950s, König
began meeting regularly in Vienna. They began to think about village communities,
were inspired by Anthroposophy, the where adults with special needs could live
teachings of Rudolf Steiner, and how these together with co-workers in extended
could be put into practice in the fields of family situations. This was first put into
health and education. They were joined by practice at the Botton Estate in 1955, and
Dr. Karl König, Viennese by birth, originally the first Camphill village as we know it
Jewish, but in his teens he stopped today was established. Botton created a
attending the local synagogue and began model that has been the basis for Camphill
attending a Catholic Church. Later he for over half a century. The village now
became deeply inspired by Anthroposophy. contains well over 300 residents in four
As the political situation became more clusters spread throughout a valley leading
threatening, they decided they had to move. up to the North York Moors in northern
After the Anschluss in 1938, when Nazi England. Throughout the world today there
Germany invaded Austria, they dispersed are more than 120 Camphill Communities in
throughout Europe. Many of them came over 20 countries.
together again at Kirkton Manse in rural
Aberdeenshire in Scotland in the beginning Camphill villages, what are they?
of 1939, where they found an already very Within Camphill villages most people live in
well established and connected British large extended families, co-workers (both
anthroposophical network. long term people with their families, and
young temporary volunteers) and villagers
They opened a curative educational institute (adults with special needs), sharing their
and began taking in children with special lives, their meals, their living rooms and
needs. When the Second World War bathrooms. There may be as many as fifteen
started some months later, the group was people or more gathered round the dining
registered as enemy aliens, the married men table three times a day. Each house has its
were interned on the Isle of Man and the own budget, and is run more or less
single men were transported to Canada. The autonomously by a team of responsible co-
women carried on working with the children workers. In the morning and the afternoon
and a larger house was found, and they everyone goes to work, in a variety of
st
moved there to Camphill House on June 1 workplaces. A typical Camphill village might
1940. When the men returned the have a biodynamic farm, extensive vegetable
community then comprised of some 30 gardens, a bakery, a weavery, herb growing
people of which just less than half were and drying, and a large forest for timber
children with special needs. The group saw and firewood.
themselves as political refugees working
with social refugees. Other villages have workshops which
produce pottery, candles, dolls or wooden
During the 1940s, the community grew and toys. It is possible to eat meals in Camphill
by taking over other houses and estates, houses where the table and chairs came
created a movement. During the next few from the carpentry shop, the table-cloth
decades the Camphill network expanded and from the weavery, the plates and cups from
developed, reaching out to England, Ireland, the pottery, the candles (which are lit at
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