We have a winner of the latest Name that Amish Community quiz, who got the right answers in yesterday evening just before the bell.  Well done to Linda, who wins a year’s subscription to Family Life magazine. For those curious, I wanted to explain the thinking behind the quiz and how you could have solved it (with a bit of work! 🙂 ). Since I suggested…
These photos of a pantry in an Amish home were taken in Carroll County, Tennessee. Reader Brenda shared these some time ago and I’m just now getting to them (thanks, Brenda). What time of year do you think these photos were taken? Â For that matter, when do pantries look their thinnest? I’ve rarely done anything but deplete them, so IÂ couldn’t pinpoint when exactly canned good…
It’s been awhile since the last “Name that Amish community” quiz, so I thought it’d be a good time to bring it back. This time to add to the fun, we have a prize. Below you’ll find three photos from three different Amish settlements. Your task is to guess where each was taken (in which community, not just the state). In addition to the clues you’ll…
In 2011 and 2012, a number of Kentucky Amishmen landed in jail for not carrying an SMV safety triangle on their buggies. This story got major news attention across the nation. State law was eventually altered to allow reflective tape instead of the triangle, thanks in part to 138 hand-written letters sent by an Amishman to Kentucky legislators. While the vast majority of Amish use the triangle, a…
Over a dozen Amish appeared in a central New York court last week to express displeasure over plans to build a casino in their community. “They could not imagine staying here with a casino,” explained their spokesman, Lynn Barbuto. What problem do the Amish have with the proposed gambling house? For one, traffic, which according to the article at 13wham.com (Update: article no longer online)Â would…
Maybe more than any other Amish place name, I’ve never had a clue how to pronounce “Chouteau” (Chah-toe? Shoh-two? Choo-tee-ow? 🙂 ).  Lucky for me, this is a blog, not a podcast. Why am I pondering pronunciation quirks again? Well, our busy contributor Tom Geist checks in today with a visit to the Chouteau, Oklahoma Amish settlement. Tom, I should say, gets around pretty well. Besides recent…
The good folks at Business Insider published an article yesterday entitled “13 Money Secrets From the Amish“.  I’m in it, and frankly that came as a surprise, since I hadn’t spoken to anyone at the site in some time. My contributions appear to be drawn from info shared 4 years ago, around the time my Amish business book came out. Lorilee Craker, author of Money Secrets of the Amish, also contributes…
Reader Brad of the Brethren recently raised the question of common ownership of goods among the Amish. Amish are not like Hutterites where the vast majority of property is shared in common.  Amish individuals own private property like anyone else.  Amish households operate independently in a commercial sense, though within a web of church and community support galvanized in times of need. But what about the handful of…
Kite Kommotion is an annual event in the town of Shipshewana in the Elkhart-Lagrange Amish settlement. From the event description: “Folks can take advantage of flying their own kites or watching performances by international kite teams and professional kite exhibitions.” A reader shares photos from the event’s latest edition. I guess these photos speak for themselves. Lots of kites, lots of kommotion. As you can…
Anna J. Weaver is an Amish artist living in New York state. If “artist” doesn’t strike you as a typical Amish occupation, that’s because it’s not–at least not in the classic sense of someone who creates painting, sculpture and the like. By the sound of things, however, Anna has made a pretty decent go of it as a painter. From a recent profile in the Erie Times-News:…