The church parking lot in Holmes County was already filling when Lizzie and I pulled in. Women in plain dresses, women in jeans, and women in dress slacks moved steadily toward the doors carrying coffee cups, purses, notebooks, and homemade snacks. Some greeted each other like old friends. Others looked nervous, like they were still trying to decide whether they belonged there at all. Inside,…
An intoxicated 25-year-old woman struck an Amish buggy in Kosciusko County, Indiana several days ago, leaving behind multiple injured victims, and ultimately a trail of ugliness. And I say this is one of the uglier such stories, for several reasons. Those include what happened to the Amish victims involved – but especially for this person’s alleged behavior after the wreck happened. A Series of Bad…
Reader Shawn has been visiting the Amish community at Pearisburg, Virginia for over a decade now. The first visit of Shawn’s we saw here was back in 2014, followed by a return in 2016 to check on the newly opened Walker Valley Market. I’ve made a couple of visits myself – one on a rainy February day in 2020, and another in December 2020 when…
Another tragic buggy crash has claimed the life of a young member of an Amish community in northern Kentucky, and left two others injured. The crash happened this past Saturday in Carroll County, Kentucky, as local Amish youth were on a fishing trip. According to reporting by the Madison Courier: The teens were traveling along with other teens from an Old Order Amish community in…
Jim Halverson recently attended an auction in Gladwin County, Michigan. As you can see from the photos, it was a well-attended event, likely in the hundreds of people. It happened this past Friday, May 29. Auctions are a fixture of Amish community life. They may be estate sales, farm sales, benefit events, or simply a regular community consignment auction. Whatever the occasion, they tend to…
Ben and Rose have joined with Rose’s siblings Mike and Marty to do a lovely rendition of “Palms of Victory”. This just released today, and I bet it’s going to get a lot of listens 🙂 Rose was previously in a group with brother Mike and sister Marty, called Third Fret Harmony, which we’ve seen here before. Really neat to see them uniting/re-uniting on this…
The van heater hummed while the sky was still black outside, and I was deep asleep when— Rap tap tap, rap tap tap, rap tap tap. “Hey, Haley, are you awake?” David B’s baritone voice jolted me upright. I blinked at the clock. 6:00 a.m. Seriously? I thought. Don’t these Amish let their drivers sleep? Apparently not. I slipped out of bed quietly so I…
An Amish-owned grocery store in Newaygo County, Michigan burned to the ground overnight — destroyed in a fire that broke out around midnight Thursday. This is From WOOD TV8: GARFIELD TOWNSHIP, Mich. (WOOD) — An Amish-owned grocery store west of Newaygo burned to the ground overnight. The fire broke out around midnight Thursday at Brookside Discount Grocery on 72nd Street near Croswell Avenue in Garfield…
Ohio is home to America’s second-largest Amish population, with over 86,000 Amish living across the state. These ten communities rank as the biggest in Ohio, based on the most current Amish population estimates. Population numbers via Young Center for Anabaptist & Pietist Studies at Elizabethtown College (source link at bottom). 1. Holmes County Area Holmes County Area (Holmes, Wayne, Coshocton, Tuscarawas, Stark Counties) Community founded:…
In March of last year, eight-year-old Alma Yoder was thrown from the buggy she was riding in, after it was rear-ended about a mile from her Van Buren County, Michigan home. Alma suffered severe injuries, and later died at hospital. Her 12-year-old brother Joey was critically injured but survived. The driver of the vehicle which hit the buggy, 31-year-old Sheila Kershner, was intoxicated at the…
An Amish man named Lewis Wengerd needed to research an excavating machine. He didn’t have computer access at the time. His church bans smartphones. So he picked up his flip phone and dialed 1-800-CHATGPT. That’s not the only way the Amish are using AI — but it might be the most memorable. I had never known Chat GPT has an actual number you can call…
Last week we heard from the school superintendent of Randolph Central Schools in Cattaraugus County, New York, who placed blame for a local budget’s failure to pass on both the Amish, and those he claimed “used” the Amish to “flood the vote”. In that post I noted that those Amish living in the district, and thus having every right to vote, were likely motivated by…
Indiana is where you’ll find America’s third-largest Amish population, with over 67,000 Amish living across the state. These ten communities rank as the biggest in the Hoosier State, based on the most current population estimates. Note: two communities tie for the #10 spot, so eleven communities appear below. Population numbers via Young Center for Anabaptist & Pietist Studies at Elizabethtown College (source link at bottom)….
A pair of videos have been making the rounds showing an Amish fisherman and a boy – who I would guess is his son – hauling away a giant fish after a successful catch. The fish is a muskellunge, better known as a “muskie” – and you can tell by the way the man is lugging it on his back that it is a hefty…
A lot of things are jumping out about this Amish home listing in Guernsey County, Ohio — starting with the fact that you might drive right past it thinking it’s a commercial building. More on that in a minute. As to the locale, this home sits in one of the most Amish-dense counties in the United States (at least when it comes to number of…
We often think of the Amish as living in the Midwest, and states like Pennsylvania. But Amish communities in the South are nothing new. States like Virginia, Kentucky, and Tennessee have seen their Amish populations grow robustly in recent decades. However, there’s one part of the South that the Amish have (for whatever reason) not settled — the “Deep South”. The Deep South is most…
The Ultimate Mud Sale Guide | Jump to full 2026 Mud Sale Schedule OR scroll down 2026 Mud Sale Guide (22 Sales) When are the mud sales in Lancaster County? The Lancaster County mud sale schedule for 2026 is now available, with the traditional first event happening soon (February 27 & 28 at Strasburg Fire Company). What is a “Mud Sale”? How did it get…