This title is meant to be a bit tongue-in-cheek. What I’m referring to though, is an interesting development brought to my attention by reader Al in KY. I’ve noted here in the past how the Elkhart-LaGrange and nearby Nappanee Amish settlements (first and third largest in Indiana) have essentially “grown together” in that their areas touch and overlap. For example: “Even in 2006, Amish settling…
I put together a video on my five favorite Amish communities to visit. In total I’ve been to around 70 Amish communities, many of them multiple times. These are my favorites to return to. I won’t give away the communities here, but I can say that one is in Ohio, two are in Pennsylvania, one in Virginia, and one in Tennessee. Okay, okay, I’ll give…
The latest Amish population statistics have been released by the Young Center for Anabaptist & Pietist Studies at Elizabethtown College. After looking over the numbers I can share that – no surprise here – the Amish population is larger this year than the last. The new estimated tally is 373,620, an increase of a bit over 12,000 over the past year. This rate of growth…
We’ve got another collection of Don Burke photos for you today – this batch from the Amish community at Chetopa, Kansas (Labette County). We don’t talk too often about the Amish in the Sunflower State, but they have a solid and long-running presence there. In fact, several of the oldest Amish communities are in the state (namely the Haven/Yoder, Hutchinson, and Garnett communities). Chetopa is…
On Saturday my brother and I paid another visit to the Swartzentruber Amish settlement in western NC (the area of Polkville & Ellenboro). I am happy to report that the community is up to 22 households, up from around 14 in late 2019. At that time I had been informed a couple of families had moved away, and wondered if that signaled a declining trend….
I have written a lot about visiting new Amish communities (new for me, that is) over the years. And so this past December when on a trip through Kentucky, Virginia and Ohio, I filmed what it is like for me when I go to a new community. As I’ve written before, I usually just try to find Amish businesses and start from there. That’s what…
Here are some of the things I saw yesterday visiting Amish communities in Kentucky. I made it to four different settlements, stopped in a couple of stores, and met some nice people. Kentucky is increasingly loaded with Amish settlements (around 50 of them) and it seems like wherever you are, you’re a stone’s throw from some sort of Amish community. My first stop yesterday. They…
I’ve been out visiting Amish communities for the past couple of weeks. Last week I was in Colorado, visiting four of the state’s six settlements. The views were spectacular and it was nice to see how Amish live in the West. Distances are greater and several Amish people I spoke with noted the dry climate but people also love the natural beauty of that state….
Joe Donnermeyer of the Journal of Plain Anabaptist Communities guest posts today with a look at multi-settlement Amish counties across America. In March I did a list of 10 Amish “supercounties” – which I defined as having at least five settlements (full or partial) within their borders. Joe expands on that list with this guest post. He actually finds 20 counties that qualify under the…
Reader Rebecca Rury recently took a visit to the only Texas Amish community, at Beeville in Bee County. She stopped in at the community’s best-known Amish business – Borntrager’s Combination Shop – but writes that she “didn’t get to chat with Mr. Borntrager as he was busy shoeing a horse.” Mr. Borntrager is the owner of the combination shop, and the bishop of this community….