Will it be possible to attend a Lancaster County mud sale in 2021? Every year in early January I post a listing of the coming year’s mud sales. I have not done so yet this year due to the uncertainty (in 2020, many were cancelled due to COVID). Looking at the current schedule, things do […]

Continue Reading Lancaster County Mud Sales 2021 (The Sales Still Happening & Cancellations)

Anna Schrock has an unusual backstory for a person who grew up Amish. Her family was a part of the New Order Amish movement in Lancaster County. The New Order Amish are primarily associated with Ohio, and particularly Holmes County (though today there are communities in quite a few other states). As the Ohio New […]

Continue Reading The New Order Amish in Lancaster County

These near-perfect photos by David Marvitz almost look like something staged or taken from a film. Actually, the scenes remind me of some of Bill Coleman’s masterpiece photos taken in the Big Valley of central PA, which have a similar quality. But these are real Amish at work – cutting and collecting ice in the […]

Continue Reading A Dozen Amishmen Collect Ice From A Frozen Pond (14 Photos)

This fatal accident happened very early Sunday morning – in reality, more likely the tail end of Saturday night: GOUVERNEUR, N.Y. — A North Country man was killed in a crash after the horse-drawn Amish buggy he was riding was hit by an SUV, according to State Police. Troopers say the accident happened around 5:15 […]

Continue Reading 20-Year-Old Killed In North Country (NY) Buggy Crash

From the outside, this Pennsylvania Amish home is neat and tidy but not particularly remarkable: But inside, the photos are some of the nicest I’ve seen of an Amish home interior: I think that’s in part due to the quality of the photography, but the home is very neat with a lot of nice woodwork […]

Continue Reading Inside An Amish Home With A Picture-Perfect Interior (21 Photos)

This story via WKYC actually dates back over four years. I came across it recently while searching for something else, and was moved to want to share it with you. It’s a remarkable story of one 11-year-old Amish boy helping his twin brother, who was severely burned in a fire. This happened in Holmes County […]

Continue Reading Amish Boy Helps Twin Brother Following Severe Burns (2016)

As the US gets walloped by winter weather bringing ice and snow to places that rarely have it, I thought this slice of life photo would be just the thing today. I like this photo for several reasons – the visual aspect of it – but also the mystery behind it. We don’t know where […]

Continue Reading Slice of Amish Life: Snow Pass

Since mid-January, Lovina Eicher’s sister Susan has been in the hospital battling serious health issues. In her most recent Lovina’s Amish Kitchen column, she shares about her sister’s passing. It’s frankly heartbreaking: Yes, the good Lord has knocked on our door again … Those words are from a song cousin Ernest wrote after losing his […]

Continue Reading Lovina Eicher On Losing Sister Susan

Today we’ve got a winner of Katrina Hoover Lee’s From the White House to the Amish. But first, Katrina has kindly shared an excerpt from the book – the Prologue and first two chapters. I hope you enjoy these as much as I did. You’ll find the winner and purchase links at the end. Prologue […]

Continue Reading From the White House to the Amish Excerpt & Giveaway Winner

We haven’t looked at a home like this before. When starting out in a new place, Amish families sometimes will build a shop building first, and live in a section of that, until they are able to complete a home. In a similar vein, this structure is a two-in-one deal – both the living area […]

Continue Reading This 2-in-1 Amish Shop Home Is For Sale (22 Photos)

In her latest column “Being Amish during a pandemic“, Amish Cook Gloria Yoder addresses the contention that “many Amish” are not wearing masks: I gaze out the window of our little office, wondering what tidbits to share with you all. My mind turns to the letters and notes I received from those of you who […]

Continue Reading Gloria Yoder: Why Aren’t Amish “Masking Up”?

Back in April, we learned that the ever-popular Wednesday donuts at Unity, Maine’s Community Market had been canceled due to COVID. Here’s a photo making the sad announcement (via Bangor Daily News): But the popular treats in this Amish-run destination are back: UNITY — A man driving a horse and buggy makes a sharp right […]

Continue Reading Unity, Maine Amish: “Donut Day” Is Back

From the White House to the Amish is the new book from Katrina Hoover Lee telling the story of Thomas E. Kirkman, who lived a remarkable life which took him from the highest corridors of power to becoming a convert to the Amish. The book is a real page-turner. Katrina wrote Kirkman’s story as a […]

Continue Reading Katrina Hoover Lee on From the White House to the Amish (Book Giveaway)

From Fox8.com: BERLIN, Ohio (WJW) — The Ohio State Highway Patrol is working to locate the driver it says was involved in a hit-and-run crash. The highway patrol said its Wooster Post is looking into the crash that happened on Feb. 6 at 8:34 a.m. on Somerset Drive (Township Road 359) near US 62. According […]

Continue Reading Ohio Police Seeking Hit & Run Driver In Crash That Killed Horse (Updated)

This article in the Sarasota Herald-Tribune attempts to examine if there are any connections between the behavior of the Amish and Mennonite population of the Pinecraft community, and the area’s high rates relatively high rates of infection. In a nutshell, the conclusion here is: it’s tough to say. You kind of get the feel that […]

Continue Reading Katie Troyer, The Budget & COVID in Pinecraft

You probably know by now that if you see “zero” bathrooms, that means this is going to be a plainer Amish abode. And that’s the case with this New York Amish home, which has a quite rustic look to it but appears cozy inside. The community is in western New York, in Chautauqua County. The […]

Continue Reading Inside A Zero-Bathroom Amish Home (14 Photos)

Eggs are disappearing in a major way in one Missouri Amish community. From a letter-to-the-editor in the Webster County Citizen: There is something the community needs to be aware of … someone is stealing eggs, chickens, along Highway C and some of the side roads. That may sound minor to most people, but when you […]

Continue Reading An Egg Thief Has Plagued Missouri Amish Farmers For Years

We’re not told where this singing video takes place, but the dress is Midwestern Amish. We see numerous Amish young people sitting around the table at what looks to be a youth gathering. This is a relatively new video, posted this past November. You can see a wringer washer – are we in a basement, […]

Continue Reading Amish Youth: Uplifting Singing Around The Table

The Young Center at Elizabethtown College provides annual Amish population numbers, with totals for each state, province and so on. But they also have figures for the Old Order Mennonite population, a group similar to Amish in many ways (and in some cases living next door to them as neighbors). According to their latest tallies, […]

Continue Reading The Old Order Mennonite Population (Horse & Buggy): 38,000+ in The US, Canada & Belize

We finish out the Rediscovering the Ausbund series with part 4 of 4 today. Thanks to Elam Stoltzfus for sharing with us. This series was originally published in Plain Values magazine. If you missed them, here are parts one, two, and three. Music, hymns and words are ingrained at an early age; indeed there is […]

Continue Reading Elam Stoltzfus: Rediscovering the Ausbund (Part 4)

Here’s one that’s not too common – a mobile home put up for sale by an Amish family. Amish do sometimes live in mobile homes, especially young families starting out. This one is located in Pomeroy, Ohio (Meigs County). I hadn’t heard much if anything of Meigs County, and for understandable reasons. The location is […]

Continue Reading An Amish Mobile Home For Sale (15 Photos)

This is a fun story which made me crave an Amish Country favorite. Food and Wine magazine decided to pick each state’s best sandwich. Ohio’s winner is the hot bologna and Swiss on a bun. The publication sampled this at a somewhat overlooked spot in Holmes County called Trail. Trail is known for its “Trail […]

Continue Reading Ohio’s Best Sandwich Comes From Holmes County Amish Country

A new study with COVID implications suggests that acceptance of vaccines by Amish in one of the largest communities (Holmes County) has plummeted in the past 10 years. It also finds that Amish would refuse COVID vaccination at a rate of almost 10-to-1. The key findings: The response rate was 39%. Among 391 respondents, 59% […]

Continue Reading Study: 75% Of Amish Would Reject COVID-19 Vaccine

Writing in to the Finger Lakes Times in early December, a reader made the following claim as part of a review of communism and socialism through history: The only form of communism today that is the same from several hundred years ago is the Amish. Yes, they practice a true form of communism right here […]

Continue Reading Do The Amish Practice Communism?

I came across a police report about an Amish man being harassed in the community of Sherman, Maine. The Amish are targets of harassment in some places. In some cases the harassment goes well beyond what we might think of as a simple prank. The topic has been the subject of an academic paper, as […]

Continue Reading Police Report: Amishman Followed By Truck, Harassed In Maine Community

I am sure some of you are going to recognize this sign today. I would even call it semi-famous at this point by virtue of it being photographed so much due to its location. The sign is an advertisement for a long-running root beer business at an Amish farm just outside Intercourse, Pennsylvania, the heart […]

Continue Reading Slice of Amish Life: Cold Homemade Root Beer

Spence’s Bazaar is a flea market/farmer’s market in Dover, Delaware. The market has a significant Amish presence including some popular food outlets. This is a nice account of the place, which has an 85+ year history. Image: Spence’s Bazaar Delaware State News now reports that they have been shut down temporarily, and you get one […]

Continue Reading Delaware Market Shut Down; Amish Faulted

Someone is hoping a funny photo gets roads repaired in Geauga County, Ohio. The Geauga Maple Leaf shared this photo on their Facebook page. In it we see a pair of Amish trousers upside down in what appears to be a deep pothole puddle. Completing the picture, an Amish straw hat and a couple items […]

Continue Reading Humorous “Amish” Photo Promotes Pothole Repair

On the morning of Christmas Eve, I visited an Amish community in Summers County, West Virginia. This is near the Virginia border, about a half hour’s drive from the Pearisburg, VA settlement. The town is Forest Hill. The first place we came across was this double-business – Shady Hillside Variety Store and Kountry Crust Bakery. […]

Continue Reading A Visit To The Amish Of Summers County, West Virginia (42 Photos)

I’m not sure that looking back “favorite” will be a word I’ll associate with 2020. But there were certainly bright spots in what most would probably agree was not the greatest year. In that spirit I am keeping with the usual tradition here of sharing a “favorite posts” year-end compilation. These are posts which either […]

Continue Reading Favorite Posts Of 2020

This summer we learned about Goot Essa, an Amish cheese maker in central Pennsylvania. The business had adapted to the recent disruption and started selling their foods online (with non-Amish help to run the website). Last week I spoke with Goot Essa’s founder, John Esh Jr. John has kindly answered some questions – about his […]

Continue Reading Q-and-A with John Esh of Goot Essa (Holiday Cheese & Fudge Gift Basket Giveaway)

Molly asks a good question on the recent Lancaster farm stay post: Eric, would you tell us the differences between Lancaster county & Holmes county? We have visited Holmes county, but would like to know the differences. As the two largest and most-visited Amish communities, people often wonder which one of Holmes County and Lancaster […]

Continue Reading Which Community Should You Visit? 7 Differences Between Lancaster County & Holmes County

Swartzentruber Amish homes are among the very plainest. They tend to fetch lower prices when put on the market, in part due to their lack of basic amenities including not just electricity but bathrooms and plumbing. This Swartzentruber home was last listed at $130,000 in spring 2019, though the Zillow listing now has its “Zestimate” […]

Continue Reading An “English-Ready” Swartzentruber Amish Home (15 Photos)

There is an interesting discussion on the Ag Talk forum about Amish pies. The original post is basically a complaint that pies made by the Amish in the poster’s area of central New York are not very good. An excerpt: I’ve tried 3 different Amish sources 2 on farms and one at a Amish store. Yesterday […]

Continue Reading Beware of Amish-Made Pies?

As it does around this time each year, the Young Center at Elizabethtown College has just published its Amish population estimates for 2020. The total estimated Amish population is 350,665, found in 31 states, four Canadian provinces, and two South American countries. Some interesting takeaways from the figures: 1. Four Large Settlements. The largest settlement, […]

Continue Reading The Amish Population Has Doubled Since 2000 – Now Exceeds 350,000 (2020 Amish Population Figures)

Well, not exactly like the Amish, if you’re ordering online. But I still wanted to draw your attention to Shetler’s Wholesale, a business based in Indiana with a long history of selling household goods to Amish via traditional catalogs. “Wholesale” is in the name, but they sell retail to individuals. They have now launched an […]

Continue Reading Shop Like The Amish At Shetler’s Wholesale (Now Online)

As we learned in last year’s post on 5 interesting facts about Lehman’s, the customer makeup of this simple products retailer is more English than Amish (by a factor of 4 to 1). And the product line reflects this to some extent. The company has a wide array of products fitting the “old-fashioned/off-grid” concept. But […]

Continue Reading 6 Lehman’s Products Used By The Amish

I came across something that got my attention while searching for Amish homes to share with you. Right now there are at least 7 Amish homes for sale in the community at Hillsboro, Kentucky (Fleming County). What’s going on here? It looks like a lot of people are moving out of the area for some […]

Continue Reading 7 Amish Homes For Sale In One Community (40 Photos)

“Kettle will not stay, neither will the windmill.” That was the stipulation attached to this unusual listing for an Amish home in the Seymour, Missouri community. This Amish home caught my eye for several reasons. For one, the community. Seymour is a plain settlement where many homes have a distinctive shingle-siding plain look to them […]

Continue Reading Look Inside A (Very) Plain Amish Home (25 Photos)

Amish have lived in Pontotoc County, Mississippi for a quarter-century. I made an unplanned visit to this community in late January. It was slightly out of the way, but well worth it. I hope you enjoy these photos and my comments on this Swartzentruber Amish settlement of two church districts. Amish came here in the […]

Continue Reading A Visit To The Amish Of Pontotoc County, Mississippi (25 Photos)

A comment by Al in KY got me thinking about how many Amish settlements I’ve actually visited. I had tallied this up before, but it was years ago. So I thought it a good idea to put together a fresh list. I believe the very first settlement I went to was Lancaster County, but that […]

Continue Reading My Amish Settlement List (58 Communities)

We caught a glimpse of North Carolina’s Swartzentruber Amish settlement in an article back in May, when someone interviewed a man from this community as he waited at an Alabama Amtrak station. More recently I previewed the community auction which was to take place in late November. Amish began moving to the area near Ellenboro, […]

Continue Reading Visiting North Carolina’s Swartzentruber Amish Community (31 Photos)

So after I visited Charlotte County, Virginia in April, I wrote about a local Amish variety stand. In that post I mentioned the following, about a different place: As I finished up my purchase, the girl directed me to a dry goods store not too far away. After she gave me directions explaining that it was […]

Continue Reading A Visit To An “Off The Map” Amish Dry Goods Store

On the heels of the “20 Unique Ways Amish Raise Their Kids” article, another click-magnet piece popped up on my news feed this morning. This one is called “15 Insane Rules All Amish Kids Must Follow.” I take “Insane” in this context to mean crazy, odd, or absurd (that is, according to the article writer/editor). […]

Continue Reading 15 “Insane” Rules All Amish Children Must Follow..?

Amish are well-known for living by guidelines and rules governing technology, dress, and other aspects of daily life. But Amish churches are not all the same. Some are more traditional, and others more progressive. Some do things one way, and others do things another way. So how do Amish know the dos and don’ts specific […]

Continue Reading 6 Examples of Amish Ordnung Rules

Ever noticed how Amish women in different places wear different head coverings? A good example is the heart-shaped Lancaster women’s covering, versus the straight-sided, pleated coverings worn by Amish women in the Midwest. Like other items of Amish clothing, there are quite a few different styles of women’s coverings, and some with rather subtle differences. […]

Continue Reading Comparing Amish Women’s Head Coverings (19 Photos)

Donald Kraybill is the author of over a dozen books on the Amish, and currently serves as Senior Fellow Emeritus at the Young Center for Anabaptist and Pietist Studies at Elizabethtown College. I asked Don if he’d answer some questions for us today on the Amish and his newest book, called Simply Amish: An Essential […]

Continue Reading Donald Kraybill on Simply Amish (Q-and-A & Giveaway)