"A divine harmony within a divine economy" was the keynote of the beliefs and everyday lives of the Harmony Society in the village and adjacent area known as Old Economy in Ambridge.
Old Economy was the third home of the Harmony Society from the Rhine Valley of Germany. The first was Harmony, in Butler County, Pa.; the second was New Harmony, Indiana. When they came back to Pennsylvania, they named their village on the Ohio River, "Economy," consistent with their manner of life.
While they awaited the Second Coming of the Lord which they expected to happen at any moment, they did not fold their hands and remain idle. They provided their own livelihood, as William Penn knew they would when he invited them to Pennsylvania. In time, they built up a surplus of goods and accumulated money which they invested in cultural self improvement, economic progress of Western Pennsylvania, and finally, to finance a return to the Holy Land, after the "Millenium." In a nearby cemetery, the Harmonists lie, in unmarked graves, equal in death as in life.