© 1998 by Mary Lou Seymour and Claire Wolfe. This is a work in
progress. You may download it for your own use, but it is not yet for circulation.
We welcome any comments, corrections or additions you care to offer.
LOCATION: Finding the right place
Before you search for a location, you should have identified your own major needs and desires, or those of your gulch planning group. Some needs are going to be peculiar to you and the individuals you're working with. But in general, you should think about these factors:
Qualities that make a location suitable (or unsuitable) for gulching
Location within country. When a number of us tried to establish a gulch group, the first thing we ran into were regional loyalties. Basically, there was one group that absolutely refused to consider any place east of the Mississippi and another group, located in the southeast, that had no interest in anything north of the Mason-Dixon line. The former group (correctly) pointed out the more freedom-friendly philosophical climate of the intermountain west. The latter (correctly) pointed out the lack of water, harsh climates and poor agricultural conditions. The groups agreed to disagree.
In all probability, you will end up drawing most gulch members from one region of the country unless you also draw some who are fleeing one region for another. Don't count on attracting anyone to a geographical area where they aren't inclined to go.
Remember that people are always going to have lots of other considerations, besides safety and security. Most will want to remain near extended families, jobs, beloved recreation, etc. This will remain true until they're faced with catastrophe. Then it's too late. Don't locate your gulch where people aren't otherwise inclined to go.
Relationship to cities and transportation routes. An independent gulch should be located at least 100 miles from any major city. (That is, from the most outlying suburb of a major city.) It should be off major transportation routes. In event of any catastrophe, refugees are going to come spilling out of cities in search of loot, food and refuge. Don't be in their path.
We are considering "major cities" to be agglomerations like New York City, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Denver, Seattle, Pittsburgh, Atlanta, Dallas, St. Louis, and (above all) Washington DC metropolitan areas divorced from all contact with rural life that have sprawled out to devour other cities around them.
As Mary Lou points out, cities like Columbia, Augusta, Cheyenne, Boise, Spokane, Pierre, Portland (Maine), Paducah and Des Moines are a different animal. These smaller, more self-contained places present less of a danger. ML suggests that placing yourself 50 miles beyond any of these should be sufficient.
But ultimately, no simple equation will do. Your safety zone from cities will depend on many factors, such as area agriculture, roads and surrounding population levels.
If you are gulching within a city (not something we recommend), try to be in a well-established section that identifies more with its block or its neighborhood than with the larger city. Think defensibility.
Affordability. What you and your gulch members consider affordable is going to vary from what we consider affordable. No doubt, some gulches will look like luxury resorts and some like trailer parks. The main thing is, don't price your gulch out of the range of fellow freedom lovers who might be able to provide valuable services. Mary Lou's biggest gripe about Rand's gulch is that those fancy folks couldn't have gotten their plumbing done because no plumbers could have afforded to live there. If your gulch is inherently high-priced, then be sure to arrange in advance for some labor swaps.
Remember, the most affordable place of all is the place you already own and don't have to move out of. If this means gulching right in some small town with your existing friends, don't reject that option, simply because it seems "too easy." Think of ways to organize yourselves, "harden" your dwellings and vehicles, and establish private lines of transportation and communication.
ML adds: "Too many of us assume that we'll be able to pick up skills such as plumbing, carpentry, farming as needed or learn them from a book. Some skills only come with years of practice...sure, I intellectually know how to repair a distributor, and, could probably sit there with a auto mechanic book and stumble through it...but, it's not 'in my hands.' Some skills, like the all important skill of jerry rigging, seems to be something you're born with.
"Make sure that your gulch values the plumbers at their real worth...not as hired labor, if the plumbers are to be a "part of the gulch."
Water source and quality issues. Availability and reliability of drinkable water and agricultural water should be among your first concerns. If you are settling in an existing community with its own water systems, investigate their reliability and their vulnerability to contamination, attack or computer glitches.
If you are planning a rural gulch, be aware of conditions in the aquifers in the area. Can you dig a well, or will you have to drill one? Is water potable at shallow levels? How will you draw the water in event of a power loss? If there is an open source of water (lake or river) is the water potable? Is there any risk it could be diverted? Can you divert it, or any part of it, for your use?
Soil and land qualities. Know the soils in the area. Know other geologic conditions, such as earthquake faults (even small ones).
Privacy & concealability. A good gulch, wherever it's located, offers privacy to its members and can be concealed in some way from prying eyes. In a city or small town, these characteristics can be achieved simply by the normal behavior of the gulchers. Act as your neighbors do and no one will notice that you don't really live like them. This is another good reason for gulching in an area you're accustomed to. Making a radical move from city to country, north to south or east to west, you might stick out like the proverbial sore thumb.
Elsewhere, concealability might mean locating in a draw or valley where the community would be visible only from the air. (Be aware that governments of all types routinely survey the land by satellite now, looking for everything from unauthorized irrigation to decks built without permit.) However they are achieved, privacy and concealability are crucial to the success of any gulch. Never sacrifice them!
Tourism & recreation in the area. Although it's tempting to locate in areas rich with beauty and recreational opportunities, these places will attract trouble in a crisis. They are simply too well known. Some of those folks flooding out of cities are going to stick to the main highways. Others are going to head for some well-remembered lake or resort.
You may need to seek some balance in this regard. Great recreation areas often have fish, game, timber and other survival plusses. But you have to measure the minuses against them. They're also usually pretty expensive which, unless you're planning a big bucks Gulch, may be an insurmountable negative right there.
Agriculture. Ideally, your gulch should be in an area with a diverse agricultural base where you'll be able to either grow, or trade for, veggies, meat, milk, animal food, food grains and other basic needs. This isn't easy to find! Modern agriculture tends to feature huge farms and ranches dedicated to one or two purposes. If you can't find a place that already has a diverse agricultural base, try at least to find one with the potential (climate, soils, attitudes) for diversity.
Climate. See "location within the country," above. Say what you like about climate, most people are going to lean toward parts of the country where they feel comfortable with the conditions. Only secondarily are they going to consider how survivable those conditions may be in a crisis.
Mary Lou favors the warm, wet climate of her native south and argues that it's better for agriculture, winter survival and water supplies. Claire, who thinks anything over 70 degrees is hell, makes the traditional harsh-climate argument that "soft" climates attract people looking for an easy ride people who may be the greatest danger to all gulchers. A place like Minnesota may not look, objectively, as if it has favorable survival conditions. But the people there, who live every day with the understanding that their climate can kill them, have created some of the most favorable survival conditions in the nation.
The thing is, both ML and Claire are right for different reasons. The only absolute we'd utter is: Don't choose a climate that's so dry you risk having no water in an emergency.
Neighbors. One way or another, you are going to have neighbors. They may be a mile away or across the back fence, but they're going to be a factor in your operation. Your best course is likely to be remaining cordial and helpful to them while never actually getting close. Anyone who has ever lived in the country or in a location where life presented daily hazards understands this relationship you're there to help each other, you say your howdies, but you don't buddy up.
As gulchers, you're also probably going to want to trade with your neighbors and in the best of all bad worlds help defend each other.
All this is ideal. You might also end up firing lawsuits at each other. Or, in this day of raids based on tenuous word from "anonymous informants," you might end up being busted because some neighbor decides you're dangerous whackos, drug dealers or whatever. You can never really know your neighbors until you've gone through hard times with them. But to the best of your ability, try to learn who they are in advance and get some idea of their attitudes.
Attitude of governments. Obviously, you want your gulch to be in a place where governments won't hassle you too much. You can't get away from the fedgov, of course. It will hassle you from border to border and straight into the grave. And all governments, at all levels, are mostly a pain in the wahzoo. So your two main goals, where governments are concerned, should be to 1) pick a place where the state and local governments are at least a little less horrible than usual, or where they can be bought off so they leave you alone and 2) stay out of their way as much as possible. Several of the intermountain west states qualify as "less horrible," while many in the south and east have a reputation for being more bribable.
Promising states in this regard include:
But the "goodness" of governments varies so greatly from city to city and region to region that we recommend you check out the local governments first (all of them, including the various proliferating non-elected boards and commissions) and make the state government your secondary consideration
ML adds: "Local governments usually have much more power over day to day life than the feds or state government through regulations of every sort, from zoning to building codes to trailer permits. Small rural towns (as long as they aren't 'yuppie meccas') and rural counties generally tend to have less intrusive governments. Rural areas in the deep south, that haven't yet been overrun by retiring Yankees who want to impose big city restrictions, are generally very laissez faire."
That's also true of the intermountain west. But let the yuppies "discover" your area, or let too many Californewyorkers show up, with their lifetime absorption in and with regulation, and laissez faire is doomed.
You may have the idea of moving into a rural area or small town and
taking over a local government. We do not recommend this! It's an
inherently corrupting process. It's a great way of attracting trouble to
yourself. (Your group may outnumber the locals, but the ones who've been
there longer will always find ways to strike back at you.) And it's far
too public to be truly gulch-like. Safety rarely lies in taking over a
government. Besides, if you succeed in taking over a government, you'll
not only have to run it, but preserve your ugh! -- "power base"
or be out on your ass. A nice way to become corrupt fast.
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