The Colony

The Colony. It was 1952 and James Jones had just published from Here to Eternity, a huge best seller that had taken the country by storm. His larger-than-life mentor, a formidable Midwest housewife by the name of Lowney Handy, set up a "writer's colony" in Marshall, Illinois, funded in large part by the proceeds of Eternity, to train an odd assortment of rules: No women; members literally copied pages from masters such as Hemingway, Fitzgerald, and Dos Passos; no radios, newspapers, or TV; meals were Spartan; a neophyte from a tent to a barracks-like room if he abided by the rules; mail was scrutinized as in the Soviet Union; about every month members were let loose in Terre Haute for brothel time in Cherry Street and epic toots.