Fascinating. Are there other examples of industrialists from that era building their own towns? I know I have heard of some, but none come to mind right now.
In Brazil there are dozens, most of them English, some examples:
Paranapiacaba, a railroad village at the end of a major inclined place railroad overcoming the coastal range, close to Sao Paulo: https://goo.gl/maps/hE5X7sVhZ4K2
Brazilian Meat Company (today Frigorífico Anglo) in Barretos, the first cold-storage slaughterhouse in Brazil: https://goo.gl/maps/hWuQPGwViF32
Boulder City, Nevada, was built as a semi-permanent town in 1931 to house 5,000 working on the Hoover Dam.
The Wikipedia entry says the city "was exceptionally rare as an example of a town fully planned under government supervision. This is unlike 19th century privately funded company town examples found in the United Kingdom, such as Port Sunlight, or in the United States, such as Pullman, Chicago."
The thing that fascinates me about company and government towns is the rules the residents ended up having to follow. In Boulder City, no drinking, prostitution or gambling. In Saltaire, UK, no hanging washing on a line, or "Gatherings or loitering of more than eight persons in the streets".
Boulder City has retained status as an anti-gaming community despite being not much other than a quiet retiree town these days, and work on the Hoover Dam being complete for a long time now.
In France the Familistère de Guise is renowned, as a kind of socialist utopia for workers, built by an industry leader to house the workers. It's not exactly a "town" but I think it's close enough as it housed 1700 people and took care of their every need.
Alfred Dolge built a factory town near the Adirondacks and gave his workers health care, insurance, and profit-sharing in the 19th century: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alfred_Dolge
C. Harold Wills was Henry Ford's first employee and right hand man. Henry couldn't pay him initially so he granted him perpetually ten percent of the companies earnings. That became rather expensive and he eventually bought him out.
Wills wanted to build the perfect automobile which had to be built in the perfect town by workers who could walk to work. Having lots of money he bought some farmland near Port Huron, Michigan and created the town of Marysville.
Unfortunately Wills was a far better engineer than a business person. The car, the Wills Ste Claire, was quite innovative but he eventually went broke.
