Just what is a skid house? And why would you want to move one? Karen Johnson-Weiner explains below, complete with photos of a skid house being loaded and moved in a Swartzentruber Amish community in upstate New York. — A “skid house” is the equivalent of a mobile home for more conservative Amish. It is built—on wooden skids—so that it can be taken apart and moved….
Last week’s look inside an Amish home drew quite a few comments, here on the website and on our Facebook page. Some of you felt the home was beautiful. One commenter “love[d] the simplicity.” Others felt the home looked “a little fancy for Amish”. It made me realize we all have different ideas of what an Amish home “should” look like. But the Amish, as tends to be…
I’m in Lancaster County this week, catching up on all the pie I’ve missed eating, and doing other important thing like that…but I will be popping in here periodically. And we have some posts lined up for you. Look for another “Five Points” list post on Wednesday (topic hint: this week’s list was inspired by the response to one of last week’s posts). And on…
In today’s post, Janneken Smucker gives us a glimpse of the homes and quilts of “Church Amish” in Lancaster County, over 70 years ago. — Recently my research interests have expanded from Amish quilts to New Deal era photography. Luckily, there is a small group of photographs in which these two topics perfectly mesh: photographs Irving Rusinow took of Amish and Mennonites in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, during the…
We often talk about the largest Amish communities – meaning the geographic locations where Amish live. The Lancaster County settlement is one example of an Amish community. Amish affiliations are something different. As noted in an earlier post on affiliations, the term “describe[s] groupings of Amish churches of similar practice, identity, and lifestyle.” To take the example above, the “Lancaster” affiliation includes the Lancaster County Amish–but also includes…
Reader Ashley recently alerted me to photos of what can only be an Amish-owned home in the Belle Center, Ohio community. This home is up for sale, and you can see over two dozen photos of it at the realtor’s listing here (Update: photos no longer online, but we’ve posted some of them below). We’ve seen a few photos from a Belle Center Amish home…
I always like being out and about in Amish communities on Sunday morning. It’s a peaceful time on the roads, which are often full of buggies and people walking to church service. Don Burke recently visited a Missouri community and captured some of those images, which he paired below with a special selection from the Psalms. Here’s Don with background on the photos and his…
You’re never too old to throw a snowball, right? I’m 36, and I’ll confess to tossing a few earlier this winter, so I hope not 🙂 . On the lighter side of things, the photos here are from a snowball fight that broke out among Amish youth somewhere in northern Indiana. The photographer writes: “A youth was joining church today in our district and there were…
Karen Johnson-Weiner follows up last month’s Ohio ice harvest post with a look at how the practice differs among the Swartzentruber Amish in upstate New York. — The recent article about ice harvesting in Mt. Vernon, Ohio, brought back memories of an ice harvest in nearby Heuvelton, New York—a similar event with a similar goal. In each case, thick ice on an outdoor pond was cut…
In today’s guest post, Suzanne Woods Fisher looks at the development of Amish plain dress, and the role played by Amish founder Jacob Amman. As Suzanne explains, Amman would have known something about clothing. — Why do the Amish dress the way they do? Simple clothing identifies the Plain People as set apart, as individuals belonging to a larger whole, the way a military uniform sets apart a soldier….