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 would have been with my parents as a young child…
Monroe Yoder is an Amish bishop in the Shipshewana area of northern Indiana. In 2018, he invited a tour group into his home and spent time answering their questions, along with his wife Susie. This was written up on a blog called Midwest Wanderer by someone who attended the occasion. The post was just brought to my attention by a relative of Monroe. I pulled…
I made it to the auction in Ethridge, Tennessee, several weeks ago – really just the tail end of it. When we arrived at the farm (having driven back up from Mississippi), the final sales were happening, people were loading up their buys onto trucks and horse-drawn transport, and things were generally wrapping up. There was still a good bit of activity happening though, and…
SI Live has published photos of Amish visitors to Staten Island, NYC in a nice slice-of-life look at Amish tourism. Of course “Amish tourism” usually means non-Amish people visiting places like Lancaster County. But as these images show, tourism goes the other way too. It seems that reporter Jan Somma-Hammel was at a Staten Island beach when a vanload of Amish happened to pull up….
Joseph Donnermeyer of Ohio State University today shares with us an article published two weeks ago in the Budget newspaper. In it, Joe looks back at all the Amish settlement attempts throughout their history in North America. He highlights some interesting figures, including a total of 342 settlement attempts since 2000. At first that seemed higher than I’d expect, but it only underscores the growing…
This past December, a group of Amishmen visited the White House and met with the president and vice-president. After the report of this unusual meeting emerged, Steven Nolt, author of A History of the Amish, shared a follow-up, adding some interesting detail about Amish encounters with past presidents. Steve first addresses the question: Was this the first time Amish people were guests of a president…
This is not what they call getting off on the right foot. An Amish business in LaGrange County, Indiana caught fire yesterday and burned down on its very first day of operation. And it was not a small shop. From WSBT: “It was fully involved two-thirds of the way down,” said Huffman. “This building is approximately 200 feet long by about 90 feet wide. And…
I always tell people that if you are new in an Amish community, and want to meet the locals, the best thing to do is to visit their businesses. Larger communities like Lancaster County and Holmes County have significantly more Amish businesses. But they’re not as densely located or convenient to visit as in Ethridge, Tennessee‘s community of 11 church districts. It seems every other…
Amish Cook Gloria Yoder is expecting, and she is thinking about a name for her boy or girl. How do Amish parents decide on a baby name? Gloria shares her family’s approach – and some common Amish naming conventions – in her latest column: While some Amish communities stick with using only one name, in our community most of us go by two names besides…
It must be that time of year. After Lovina Eicher gave us an up-close look at pon hoss, Gloria Yoder describes a butchering event in her church. I know some people don’t like to read about these topics. But on the other hand, it’s good to recognize and appreciate that meat doesn’t just come from a grocery store. A reality of life in Amish communities…