Rumspringa

Last Sunday I attended an Amish youth singing in Lancaster County.  What follows is a short account.  Youth practices may vary from community to community. Amish youth groups The singing is a venue where young members of the community socialize.  When an Amish teen reaches the age of 16, he or she will be expected [...]

Continue reading At an Amish youth singing

In this final installment, Aaron Miller continues his discussion of choice in Amish society: Let me list some choices that I and other Amish people make in their daily lives. One of the first financial lessons I teach my boys goes like this. When we are about to attend a social function or community event [...]

Continue reading Boxers or Briefs? Aaron Miller on choice in Amish society (part two)

Perhaps no aspect of Amish society has received as much popular attention as the idea of “Rumspringa“.  Various media including books, TV and documentary film have addressed the youth period, also know as a time of “running around”.  Amishman Aaron Miller, who in the last installment discussed the Ordnung, addresses misconceptions and realities of Rumspringa: [...]

Continue reading Rumspringa-Myths and Reality

The Bloomfield Amish community is one of the largest in Iowa The Amish community lying north and west of Bloomfield, Iowa is one of the three largest in the state.  Like the nearby settlement at Kalona, and the more conservative group found in Buchanan County in the northeast part of the state, Bloomfield is home [...]

Continue reading The Bloomfield, Iowa Amish settlement

I recently came across a transcript from George Bush senior’s 1989 meeting with Mennonite and Amish leaders in Lancaster County.  It’s interesting to read not only for those seeking late 80s era nostalgia but for the interesting dynamic between the President and the typically spotlight-shunning Amish and Mennonites as they take the stage in a [...]

Continue reading Bush 41, Amish, Mennonites, and drugs

I like to check in at Ira Wagler’s blog from time to time.  Always nice writing.  Ira grew up Amish in Canada and Iowa, and thus can offer a viewpoint that non-Amish people, like yours truly, cannot. In a recent post, Ira shares his personal take on Rumspringa.  He comes out against some popular perceptions [...]

Continue reading Ira Wagler, running around

Rick weighs in with an action shot of an intense game of cornerball, aka ‘eck balle’, from an auction this past weekend at Georgetown in Lancaster County. This apparently wasn’t the only sport being played;  Rick mentions a few games of football and volleyball going on as well.  He comments:  ‘I am imagining the football [...]

Continue reading Amish cornerball battle

Thanks to Rick for this photo of a Lancaster County Amish carriage.  It’s not uncommon to see ‘young bucks’ out and about in these speedier models.  Here’s another shot from this summer:

Continue reading Built for speed

This is a bit of a follow-up to the post on the Amish and credit/mortgages of a couple weeks ago.  NPR ran a story on the subject earlier today on Morning Edition, and you can read a summary and listen to it here: A Mortgage Banker in Amish Country. One thing that struck me was [...]

Continue reading First Buggies and the C-word

photo:  Rob Ward Richard Stevick, author of Growing up Amish:  The Teenage Years, describes eck balle, or cornerball, as ‘the plain peoples’ equivalent of NCAA March Madness.’ From Growing up Amish: ‘Until the 1950s, cornerball flourished among most of the Pennsylvania Dutch communities, both plain and fancy.  Although the “fancy” or “church Dutch” eventually abandoned [...]

Continue reading ‘Eck balle’: disappearing sport of the Pennsylvania Dutch