Who are The Woodworkers?

The People for Earthly Heaven, The Church of Jesus Christ of Earthly Heaven, The Effigy Men, The Termite Rabble or most commonly, The Woodworkers were an obscure religious group lasting from c.1865 - c.1880 whose principal mission was the revelation and establishment of Earthly Heaven, the belief that Heaven and all those residing within lay directly over the tangible world in an invisible and intangible layer.

The term Woodworker or Effigy Men stems from the cults tradition of carving wooden effigies of their dead to act as proxies to commune with the deceased. More on burial practices here.

The woodworkers were, most importantly, a cult of personality surrounding their mysterious, hideous and mad prophet- Ernst Seidler. An unusually tall German immigrant come seeking opportunity on the transcontinental railroad, Ernst was an explosives handler armed one day with a long tamping iron... perhaps you've heard this story before.

After a long period of refusing to die, Ernst regained full consciousness and began to ruminate on his survival. The conclusion he reached is that The Lord Jesus Christ had taken on the fatality of his wound, and in the exchange for his missing eye, Christ gave one of his own to Ernst. With this eye Ernst can supposedly see the realm of heaven as it exists over the land of earth. In Woodworker culture, Jesus is often depicted with one black and one blue or red eye.

Kept alive by cocaine salve and other miracles of medicine, self-inducing violent ergotism, collecting revolvers, selling cigars and howling at the open sky, The Prophet is a wild and dangerous figure. Thus, the Woodworkers have no permanent settlement. Instead, they lead wagon trains and establish camps around existing settlements, stealing horses, property and the prosthletized away as they go.
People were entranced by his incredible story, and eventually led to cause holy havoc across the freshly re-united states....

TL;DR The Woodworkers tells the story of a Reconstruction era American cult of personality formed around Ernst Seidler, a man who believes himself chosen by God after surviving a horrific railroad accident. The one-eyed prophet compels wayward survivors and citizens of his wounded country with a promise of Earthly Heaven, a paradise waiting to be manifested. A tale of spiritual madness and the community under its spell. A tale of ruthless and frenzied faith, rooted and uprooted again and again in the bloody American soil.

Content Warnings

This universe contains many instances of very graphic violence, injury and death, cult and ritual abuse, period-typical bigotry, and unhealthy relationships. The author does not condone the actions, beliefs or motivations of their characters and will try to the best of their ability to represent these topics realistically and respectfully.
The author will also never ever under any circumstances EVER produce or edit content for this wiki using any form of generative AI. all text, images, music or video is created and edited wholly by the rotting mind of a discheveled 24 year old line cook aka me, the author, St. Franis. thank you for reading.

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consetetur sadipscing elitr, sed diam nonumy eirmod tempor invidunt ut labore et dolore magna aliquyam erat, sed diam voluptua. At vero eos et accusam et justo duo dolores et ea rebum. Stet clita kasd gubergren, no sea takimata sanctus est Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet.

Heading 4

Here are two columns:

Heading 5

This is an image:

This is a full-width image:

These are multiple images in a row:

Heading 6

Ut wisi enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exerci tation ullamcorper suscipit lobortis nisl ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Duis autem vel eum iriure dolor in hendrerit in vulputate velit esse molestie consequat.