The reader who shares today’s video clip (at end of post) writes, “it’s different, with some instruments”. Those instruments include a Casio keyboard, guitar and accordion. This is a short clip filmed last year by Ernest Bontrager in Pinecraft. He describes the group as the “Tri Valley Singers from Ohio”. The girls played on Estrada Street “to a large Amish crowd.” I would agree, it is…
What would it be like to share all your goods in common with your neighbors? Linda Maendel is a schoolteacher in a Hutterite colony in Manitoba, and could answer that question firsthand. Linda is also the author of an upcoming book called Hutterite Diaries: Wisdom from My Prairie Community. I’m happy to let you know that Linda will be sharing a look into Hutterite faith and life here on Amish America as…
Have you ever heard one Amish person suggest another Amish person is “behind the times”? It might sound funny, but you do hear things like that in places like Holmes County, Ohio. That community is a grab-bag of Amish groups–some very restrictive of technology, some liberal. Of course, Amish aren’t anti-technology. But different groups make different decisions about technology. In fact, many do use certain modern devices, tools, and gadgets. LED lights, recumbent…
A frankly creepy story has hopefully come to an end in Lancaster County. Last November you might have caught a report of an intruder entering Amish homes in eastern Lancaster County. The man in both cases would touch Amish females while they slept. He would speak to them and then leave. A 27-year-old Lancaster County man was arrested Friday and charged in one incident in East Earl township: According…
In “The Growth of Amish and Plain Anabaptist Communities in Kentucky” (see latest issue of JAPAS), Joseph Donnemeyer and Corey Anderson examine the development of Amish and other Anabaptist communities in the Bluegrass State. They also touch on Amish settlement (or lack thereof) in the southern states. I pulled some interesting points from the article to share with you below. Amish-Mennonites in Kentucky One thing to be aware…
Rich Stevick checks in from Pinecraft, where he and wife Pauline are reloading on vitamins C and D courtesy of the Florida sun and citrus. Today Rich shares excerpts from chapter 6 of Growing Up Amish: The Rumspringa Years, giving us a glimpse of life in the “Plain People’s Paradise”. The Sarasota-area neighborhood is a popular destination for older folks, Amish youth, and vacationing families. But not…
I had never been in the Nickel Mines area until after the infamous school shootings of October 2006. Even later, I never sought it out. I guess because I knew I wouldn’t feel comfortable doing so. But over the past few years I have happened to pass by a few times. Usually it was hauling Amish friends to somewhere in the southern end of Lancaster County, our route taking us…
Which are the most friendly Amish communities? Yes, to answer that question we do have to generalize. But I think it’s true that Amish communities can take on a certain character. If you’ve visited more than one Amish community and met enough people, you may have noticed this. People in some places just seem more happy to see you than in others. Below are my (non-scientific) choices for “most…
Jim Cates returns today with a look at Amish lay leaders, the National Amish Steering Committee, and solving problems outside the courts. Part one of Jim’s discussion of Amish and politics can be found here. — Politics Is the Art of Looking for Trouble The entire quote (by Groucho Marx, no less) actually goes “Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing…
From Syracuse.com: RICHLAND, N.Y. — Black horse-drawn buggies were parked outside a wooden house where Amish people were crowded inside — laughter and the smell of food spilled out of the front door Saturday afternoon. When Levi Swartzentruber came to the door though, his green eyes watered at the mention of his 6-year-old son Jonathan L. Swartzentruber. He died after being hit by an SUV…