¼PAR@ ` ┤TEXT ` ªHeinemann, Barbara1795╨1883religious leaderBorn on January 11, 1795, in Leitersweiler, Alsace, Barbara Heinemann (or Heynemann) grew up in poverty and received no schooling. From the age of eight she worked in various menial capacities. An intensely religious nature led her to the Community of True Inspiration, a Pietist sect founded in 1714 and revived about 1817 by Christian Metz and others. On Christmas Day 1818 Barbara Heinemann had a powerful religious experience and received the gift of oral prophecy, a principal element in the doctrine of the Inspirationists. She taught herself to read the Bible shortly thereafter. Overcoming the suspicion of elders in the sect, who for a time expelled her, she traveled widely with Metz to other centers of Inspirationists and helped spark the rebirth of the sect. Her marriage in 1823, however, marked her fall from grace in the eyes of her colleagues, and she lived as an ordinary member of the sect for over a quarter of a century. She and her husband, George Landmann, were among the 800 Inspirationists who followed Metz to America in 1842╨1843 and established the Ebenezer Society in Erie County, New York. In 1849 the gift of prophecy once again became manifest in Barbara Heinemann and she was accepted again as a Werkzeug, an instrument of God, and thereby a leader of the society. She ratified Metz╒s prophecy ordaining in 1854 the establishment of a new settlement far to the west, away in particular from the encroaching city of Buffalo. Land was bought in Iowa County, Iowa, and a network of seven settlements, known collectively as the Amana Society, was established. The frugal, spiritual, and communal lives of Amana╒s residents were directed by Metz and Heinemann together until Metz╒s death in July 1867 and thereafter by Barbara Heinemann alone, aided by a Great Council of the Brethren. Her pious, contentious, and sometimes willful nature made the task of holding the community together more difficult, especially as a new generation grew up to be tempted by the increasingly attractive world beyond Amana. The community did nonetheless continue to prosper as the most successful of the many communistic experiments tried in America in the 19th century. Barbara Heinemann died at Amana, Iowa, on May 21, 1883. No Werkzeug appeared to succeed her, but the society persisted in largely its original form until 1932, when by vote of its members it became a joint stock enterprise. ╓styl `
