While we’ve lately featured numerous videos of Amish singing, we haven’t had too many examples of church singing here. If you haven’t heard Amish church singing before, today’s clip of Amish singing Lebt Friedsam, by Ed Yoder, will give you a sense of what it is like. A song leader opens with the first notes of each line of the hymn. The congregation then joins…
I’m seeing more and more examples of Amish business maps, both online and off. To give a few examples, there are the multiple maps in Ethridge, Tennessee, the map we saw last week from the small Whitefield, Maine community, and this online map of the Conewango Valley, New York settlement, with over 180 Amish businesses listed. I see the maps as good marketing by people…
A very important person as regards Amish religious freedom passed away a month ago. I’m not sure how many Amish people know of William C. Lindholm today, but he was instrumental to the freedoms Amish now have in educating their children. Young Center Senior Scholar Steven Nolt shares the following on Lindholm and his relevance to the Amish: The Rev. William “Bill” C. Lindholm, the…
I’m a little puzzled by this home. It’s listed as having five bedrooms. But we don’t see any of them in the photos provided. We do see, however, other rooms, which are quite airy and spacious. This one is from the collection of 7 Kentucky homes for sale, which we’ve been looking at the past several weeks. It reflects the area’s hilly terrain, built as…
This happened Wednesday in the Smyrna, Maine community. Two young men were ejected from the buggy. One was killed; the second has critical injuries. “The crash is still under investigation, but it appears that speed was a factor,” said Aroostook County Sheriff Shawn Gillen. From the Bangor Daily News: NEW LIMERICK, Maine — A 25-year-old Smyrna man was killed Wednesday evening when a vehicle struck…
York College professor Charles A. Kauffman has a nice article just out in the York Daily Record on the Pennsylvania Dutch language. I pulled five excerpts answering questions on the language – including examples of Pennsylvania Dutch phrases, and what exactly is meant by “Dutchified” English. I’ve also included three videos, giving examples of Pennsylvania Dutch and Dutchified English by native speakers. 1. Why “Dutch”?…
Over the past decade, we’ve seen Amish in Maine slowly expand their footprint in the state. Lately they’ve been adding a community at the rate of about one every two years. The best-known is probably the seeker-friendly Unity settlement, which features in the news fairly frequently. But there are seven other settlements in Maine now, and last autumn, reader Jillian York had a chance to…
Well, not wanted by me, but by someone who’s posted a job offer on freelancing site Upwork. This is just a quirky thing I came across in my Amish news feed today. I wondered some years ago if the appeal of Amish romance would continue. Going by anecdotal evidence at least, the genre appears to still be running strong. This kind of ad seems to…
A news blurb about an accident in Lancaster County several days ago contained few details. An English friend of the family involved has just filled out the story. Three Amish sibling children were hit by a pickup truck while driving the buggy to church in Bart Township, at around 7:30 Sunday morning. Parents Dave and Liz King own the BBQ Barn at the Amish Farm…
Back one more time with another edition of five Amish surname histories. If you missed previous posts, you can find them here: Part 1 (Beachy, Swartzentruber, Lapp, Hostetler, Stoltzfus) Part 2 (Zook, Gingerich, Troyer, King, Lehman) Part 3 (Yoder, Schrock, Fisher, Stutzman, Wagler) These are excerpted from Joseph Stoll’s series “Amish and Mennonite Family Names,” which appeared in Family Life from December 1968 to March…