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magazine.catapult.co/places/stories/mountain-of-truth-a-utopian-colony-in-switzerland

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The history of a counterculture colony that welcomed anarchists, nudists, exiled poets, and unconventional loners. In the central town square of Ascona, Switzerland, I met a wiry old man who drove a clean white van. He was an Italian-speaking Swiss gentleman, tiny and bald with a herringbone snap bill cap and a faded dress shirt. Twice a day, he drove his customers up into the nearby hills, departing from the bus station area, the Autosilo. I yanked a two-Franc coin out of my pocket and gave it to him. I could have taken a bus, but the old man’s operation looked far more interesting. As we then motored up a steep curling road, we passed multimillion-dollar mansions fronted by elaborate stonework, wrought-iron staircases, and flowing ivy—each overlooking the dark blueness of Lake Maggiore below. Only a few more minutes went by before we arrived at the bottom of the very hill I’d read about in college twenty years earlier: Monte Verita, the mountain of truth. In the first few decades of

Books Magazine Archive Perception Box Books Magazine Archive Perception Box Gary Singh Apr 5, 2018 Places | Tourism Mountain of Truth: A Utopian Colony in Switzerland The history of a counterculture colony that welcomed anarchists, nudists, exiled poets, and unconventional loners. In the central town square of Ascona, Switzerland, I met a wiry old man who drove a clean white van. He was an Italian-speaking Swiss gentleman, tiny and bald with a herringbone snap bill cap and a faded dress shirt. Twice a day, he drove his customers up into the nearby hills, departing from the bus station area, th

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