Back in February I shared with you 57 Amish businesses you can visit in Ethridge, Tennessee. This was based on a visitor’s map given out at a local business. Reader Al in KY has gone one better, and passed along a much fuller guide to Amish businesses in the community for your enjoyment.

Says Al: “I counted up the number of Amish homesteads listed on this guide, and I came up about 140! Seems like it may take a week to visit all of them.”

Some of these are small places selling just a few products off the front porch. Others are more established stand-alone shops and manufacturers.

And of course, products a household or business sells can vary by season, so keep that in mind.

Where did this guide come from? Al says he picked his copy up in 2018. There are two similar places as you get into the Ethridge area; Al clarifies which is which, and where he believes this came from:

I found the Visitors Guide of Ethridge area map of Amish goods and shops I mentioned in my comments several weeks ago when you had the post about Ethridge. As far as I can remember, I got this at the Amish Welcome Center at 3943 Hwy 43 N. in Ethridge when I visited there in Oct. of 2018. This is the Visitors’ Center on the south side of Brewer Rd. in Ethridge. The Visitors Center on the north side of Brewer Rd. is the Amish Heritage Welcome Center.

When I visited Ethridge area in Oct. of last year, 2019, I asked for another copy of this Visitor’s Guide and they said they had depleted their supply, and a new shipment of them had not yet come in. I noticed on the front of the copy I have that it said it was Volume Three, Issue Two, Fall/Winter 2018. I hope they still are publishing it, because I found it to be a very good publication.

There is a map that goes along with this, but it’s spread across several pages, and would be too hard to reproduce here. I’d also just encourage you to swing by the Amish Welcome Center and pick up one for yourself (hopefully they have a fresh supply), or if that’s not available, the smaller-but-still-handy map.

140+ Amish Businesses in Ethridge, Tennessee

Photo by Don Burke

Have a look through all the different Amish places with something for sale in this community. You’ll notice certain businesses repeat, with some less common, and even a few unusual or unexpected ones (goldfish, anyone? Or how about a bumble bee trap…)

In closing, Al asks a couple of good questions:

I’m wondering if the Ethridge Amish community has the highest percentage of any other Amish community in terms of number of homesteads that sell one or more type of goods. I’m wondering also if Swartzentruber communities have a higher percentage of such homesteads than less progressive communities.

My impression would be a possible “yes” to both questions.

Photo by Don Burke

It appears that Tennessee is mostly “open for business”, so I hope this and other posts will be useful for anyone planning a trip to this community. Al adds that even with the roughly 140 businesses listed here, there are two businesses he knows of that aren’t in the guide. That might mean they came about since this edition came out.

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