Newspaper article in envelope with negatives from The Fresno Bee Jan. 3, 1950 Hutterian Religious Sect Absorbs American Ways The Hutterians, a sect of religious communists, gradually are absorbing American ways, according to Marchus Bach, professor of religion at the University of Iowa. Buttons, forbidden as a rebuke to German militarists during the Thirty Years War, finally are appearing on Hutterite clothing. Milking machines are making the lives of the women easier. Although all personal possessions and all luxuries are forbidden, elders in a South Dakota commune which Bach visited were discussing the possibility of buying a station wagon, and the influence of the outside world on the group is growing. The Hutterians, who came to American in 1874 and have eight colonies in South Dakota, two in Montana and about 30 in Canada, boast of the their high moral code: no divorces and no Hutterians ever in jail, except the pacifists in World War I. The two were young men of the Bon Homme Colony in South Dakota who died in Leavenworth Prison. They refused to shave off their beards, grown by all Hutterite married men, and went naked rather than put on prison garb. When they died they were shipped back to the colony dressed in prison clothes. The Hutterian fathers sent the clothes back to Leavenworth and buried their sons in the traditional hook and eye homespun. The unmarked graves of these two men are in the Rockport, SD, colony. Things were different during World War II. "America," said the Hutterians, "marvelously respected our rights." Bach, one of the few "outsiders" who have been allowed to penetrate the isolated Hutterian communes, reports he asked the boss of the colony what he would have to do to become a Hutterian. The man answered, "That's simple. You just give up everything you own and we put it in the colony treasury. You find work you like, dress as we do and become one of us." When Dr. Bach asked him whether that meant giving up his wrist watch and his car, the boss answered, "Why not? What do you want with a watch. We've got the colony bell. And what do you want with a car? You're not going anywhere.