Today’s photos were all (except for the first two) recently taken by a reader in the Holmes and Wayne County area. By last count there are 238 church districts in this settlement, more than any other Amish location, with over 30,000 Amish people living here. The Holmes County community is a sprawling settlement, spanning 20-some miles, as the crow flies, from north to south and east…
Maine is now home to five Amish settlements, up from three just a few years ago. Thanks to reader Judy for passing along an excellent article on the Amish of the Fort Fairfield area, in Maine’s northernmost county of Aroostook. This piece in Down East Magazine traces the path of the 6-year-old community via interviews with the community’s founder, 45-year-old craftsman Noah Yoder, and a…
Last week I made a short visit to the Pinecraft Amish community at Sarasota, Florida. I wanted to share that visit with you via a series of photos. If you haven’t heard of it, Pinecraft is an unusual Amish community for a few reasons. It is located in a city (Sarasota, population 52,811–technically just outside city limits). It is more of a vacation destination for…
Today we have some photos courtesy of Bob Rosier, taken in the sole Amish community in Texas (in Bee County, about 90 miles southeast of San Antonio). We’ve featured posts on this community before (see Bee County, Texas Amish), as well as on now-defunct Texas Amish settlements (see Amish in Texas), if you’d like to catch up on the story of the Amish in the Lone…
Since getting back from northern Indiana Monday night, I’ve been thinking about ways to share my trip with you. I usually return from these Amish journeys with a jumble of thoughts and photos…some of them become posts and some just sort of evaporate. In the interest of capturing as much of that as possible, I thought I’d just share a bunch of photos I took,…
Amish population figures are available for 2013 on the Amish Studies website. Among the new numbers you’ll find: Total church districts is estimated at 2,056 The Amish population has risen 20% since 2008 The top 10 states with Amish account for 92% of the total population “High-growth” states over the past 21 years include New York, Minnesota, and Tennessee. Among the “slow-growth” are Delaware and…
Usually right around this time each year, I notice at uptick in visits to the Amish State Guide. I attribute it to people looking for info on Amish communities with the coming of spring and summer. Are you visiting an Amish community this year? Or have you already? Here’s a list of Amish settlements I plan to, or already have visited, in 2013 (plus a…
Since 1974, David Luthy has periodically released a directory of Amish communities appearing in Family Life, with updates appearing every 5 to 10 years (the last was in 2008). Writing in last July’s issue of Family Life, Luthy observes “with 62 counties in its 49,109 square miles, New York has in the past ten years become a popular state for Amish landseekers. Such, however, was…
A photo taken by reader Rose in the Kingston/Dalton Wisconsin Amish community. What do you notice? Madison WI Amish Furniture
Meet you in the middle? There is a small Amish settlement near Degraff, Ohio, which I passed through while leaving Logan County this morning. At one stop a dozen eggs were had for just $1.50 (follow the “Produce” arrow to get there). They’re not very good eating raw though, so may need another snack to get me home. Read more on the Amish in Ohio.