A community of society-shunning Americans launched a survival retreat in the Utah desert after feeling alienated from the modern world.
Hundreds of people have pushed themselves to live off the land under ‘Operation Self-Reliance’ because they feel that going off-the-grid is the solution to a crumbling culture.
The congregation was founded by Philip Gleason, 74, a former general contractor who felt a calling to help people grow their own food, pump their own water and rely on nothing but themselves.
He admitted Desert News that while some may choose to live there for environmental or health reasons, its intended purpose was to avoid the “craziness” of the modern world and the current political climate under the Biden administration.
“It seems like we’re going through a cultural revolution in the U.S.,” he said. “When we first came here, we thought it might be too far away… Now, with everything that’s happening, we’re wondering if it’s far enough.”
For those looking to escape the constraints of society and America’s crumbling institutions, the OCR Cooperative at Riverbed Ranch in Juab County, Utah, has seen hundreds of residents choose to live off-grid.
Residents of the OCR Cooperative at Riverbed Ranch in Juab County live almost entirely off-the-grid.
Tenants each purchase their own two-hectare plot, where their only choice is to grow all their own food, as the estate has no municipal electricity system and no sanitary facilities.
Part of the co-op costs at least $35,000, but that’s before residents have to meet Gleason’s obligations, including building your own house from scratch.
Residents also have to build a shed, install a septic system, produce their own solar energy, dig a well dozens of meters below to the fresh water and build a greenhouse.
These costs, OCR’s website admits, could raise at least another $235,000, which the organization blames on “the Covid frenzy significantly increasing the cost of building materials.”
For Gleason, his five-acre plot is his chance to put his lifelong obsession with survivalism to the test, including planting sunflowers to provide shade because the Utah desert can barely support trees.
He told the Deseret News that he got the sunflower seeds from a friend living in Germany after World War II, who warned him that a lack of oil was a serious problem in their post-war rations.
Showing his ominous attitude, he joked, “We’re not that far from here.”
One of the homes built from scratch by an OCR resident, which could cost more than $235,000, which the organization blames on “the Covid frenzy significantly increasing the cost of building materials”
Residents warned that if their worst doomsday fears come true, they will feel the most prepared because “the people who control their food are the ones who come out on top.”
Gleason said he fears a variety of apocalyptic scenarios could unfold in the coming years, from a power grid failure that knocks out America’s electricity supply to nuclear war and cyberattacks.
“This is just history repeating itself,” he warned. ‘At the beginning of every cultural revolution, it is the people who control their food.’
While Americans consistently report that they are losing faith in the country’s institutions, those who have built a new life at Riverbed Ranch have essentially created their own self-sustaining nation-state.
OCR residents vote and fulfill roles on their own Board of Directors, and have a judicial system to resolve arguments through the Disputes Committee.
Like many in Utah, a majority of the community’s residents are followers of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
And the co-op has even found a way to use cash, as many also trade their own products such as bread and livestock.
More than seventy children are said to live in the commune, all of whom are homeschooled by their parents who want to raise the next generation of anti-society residents.
But without hospitals near the arid deserts, medical emergencies seem a challenge.
Gleason said he has had two heart attacks since starting the base, and only one resident is a registered nurse for home visits, while another is a midwife, who has delivered three babies so far.
Residents are purchasing two-acre lots for $35,000, where they are expected to live entirely off the land and even build their own homes and solar generators
The survivalist commune was founded by Phillip Gleason, 74, who said he decided to launch the initiative because America is ‘undergoing a cultural revolution’
And while some choose to vote by mail in a town two hours away, many residents purposefully avoid politics – with one shareholder admitting that she brought her children from California to the commune because their former deputy director “was gay and there openly advertised it’.
Another couple said they fled Democratic-run Portland because of the same anti-liberal sentiment. They said the city had “gone crazy” and they “had to get out.”
But Gleason insists that despite residents’ distaste for society, they are far from anarchists. He emphasizes that “we are not tax protesters, we have no militia, we just want to live off the land.”
He ended with a chilling warning about what could happen if his predictions – and preparations – come true.
“When we build all this out, we might be the third or fourth largest community in the country,” he said.