I found myself thinking about this after reading an article about an Idaho family. Originally running in the Lewiston Tribune under the title “Amish family in Winchester finds its way” (and elsewhere as “N. Idaho Amish family embraces modern ways”), the article contains the following description: In many ways the Miller family is as Amish as the people they left back home in Wisconsin 10…
An ancient Anabaptist hymnal The Ausbund is a very important book for the Amish. This hymnal contains centuries-old songs originating with Anabaptist captives held at the Oberhaus castle prison in Passau, located in present-day southeastern Germany. Amishman Benuel Blank wrote The Amazing Story of the Ausbund about this remarkable songbook. About the Ausbund Blank writes: The Ausbund hymnbook, used by the early Anabaptist Swiss Brethren, is…
In yesterday’s interview, Saloma mentioned an upcoming PBS special on the Amish, part of the American Experience series. American Experience has a good reputation for in-depth documentary films, mainly of a historical nature. “The Amish” is a 2-hour film described as “an extraordinarily intimate portrait of contemporary Amish faith and life”. Quite a few Amish participated as well as numerous experts on the Amish….
Saloma Miller Furlong was raised Amish in Ohio. Why I Left the Amish is the story of her childhood and adolescence, and eventual departure from Amish society. I enjoyed meeting Saloma for the first time this summer while in PA, and have always appreciated her comments here on the blog. I just recently had a chance to read Why I Left the Amish and found…
I had originally planned to try a separate post for each question, but realized that would take awhile and that some can probably be answered in shorter form. So here are some more of your questions from the “Submit your Amish questions” page. We’ll get to more later: Fr. Andre Leveille, CSC: Do the Amish have baptism, communion, confirmation, marriage, ordination and annointing of the…
Stephen B writes: While I certainly understand the idea behind Plain-ness, of not calling undue attention to one’s self out of modesty and of not wanting to be too much of this world, it seems to me that as times and fashions change, the Amish haven’t really updated their fashions enough to actually *stay* plain. That is, it was one thing, back when, to wear…
Michigan currently occupies sixth place when it comes to the size of their Amish population. The state is home to nearly 12,000 Amish in 3 dozen communities (see Young Center 2011 Amish statistics). Over one-tenth of the Michigan Amish population is found in St. Joseph County, in a settlement located near the town of Centreville. This group consisted of 11 Amish church districts as of…
We haven’t done one of these in awhile, so here are ten photos from the Adams County, Indiana Amish settlement. As you can see, it was a fairly grey day, so that didn’t help. Which do you think came out best? If you enjoyed these, some other photos: 10 views of Lancaster County Amish 10 views of the northern Indiana (Elkhart-Lagrange) Amish 10 views of Allen…
Kentucky Amish SMV problems continue. If you missed it, on Saturday, a Graves County teenage buggy driver was cited for failure to display the SMV triangle after his buggy was hit and dragged into a ditch. Five children were in the carriage, ages 7 to 15 (Amish children operate horse-drawn vehicles from a young age). Luckily they were unhurt. It should also be noted…
We’ve seen Amish in court quite a bit lately. Some cases have involved Amish clashing with laws of the state (KY SMV; PA horse neglect). Others involve grievances between Amish and former Amish (Amish beard-cutting). For another example of the latter, we can look back in history to a 1947 Pittsburgh Post-Gazette newspaper piece “‘Mited’ Amish Farmer Given $5,000 by Jury”, describing an unusual lawsuit…