I took my car in to an ‘Amish mechanic’ last week–actually an established alternator and starter repair outfit run by a white-bearded Amishman and two other Amish guys.
I’m pretty dumb when it comes to cars.
But it still seemed kind of weird when the teenage Amish kid who works there started telling me things about my engine and I had no clue what he was talking about.
Similar Posts
I just sat down this evening with a beaming blacksmith, a new father of his first little boy after many girls. I’m doing interviews for a research project/book on Amish businesses. ‘Eli’, my seventh stop of the day, graciously shared his wisdom with me. After our short talk I flipped off the voice recorder and we continued chatting over a 9pm black coffee (I’ve noticed…
Lined up in a bicycle rack in front of a barn at an Amish farm is a row of scooters in various sizes and colors–red, blue, and green. Around four o’clock in the afternoon, Simon Bontrager went looking for his five-year-old son, Reuben, finding him high up in a tree house perched over a stream. Simon cupped his mouth to holler up the tree, “Hey,…
The full Chapter 1 excerpt of Success Made Simple has already been available online here. Today, I’ve gotten permission to share one last bit–the preface, where I describe the story behind the book. Hope you enjoy it. Unearthing the Secrets I pull my truck into the drive, unsure whether to continue. It’s midafternoon, and I’m down on my numbers for the day, so I decide…
When we hit the dog days of summer, there are times I just feel like crawling into the freezer, closing the door and hanging out in there awhile (I guess I’d need a bigger freezer to make this dream happen). Home freezers are another one of those once-luxuries, now-conveniences which we use, really 24/7, but tend to take for granted. Not all Amish have such easy…
One of the highlights of President Obama’s State of the Union speech last night was a call for clean energy. The president put forth a goal: “by 2035, 80% of America’s electricity will come from clean energy sources.” “Clean energy” in this case means “wind and solar…nuclear, clean coal, and natural gas”. To me, that sounds a bit ambitious. Solar currently accounts for less than…
Last night while lounging around with Abe and Sara, we suddenly heard one of their little boys begin coughing and crying, clearly audible through the air vent in the ceiling. Abe knew instantly what was wrong by the sound. “That’s the croup,” he decided, a bit glumly, and stood with his wife to go attend to the children. It was past ten o’clock already and…
7 Comments
I hope they get it fixed for you! Sounds like they know what they are doing! :o)
hello
i am a new reader iso an amish furniture maker to make some class room desks for a walforf school in the oc…would you could you connect me to one?
thanks so much
erika
hi Erika
would love to help and may have sb in mind but what is your location more or less (state)? Might be somebody in Ohio or here in PA
hi
orange county cal.
about 45 miles south of los angels.
erika
Amish-made desks in Ohio
Hi Erika I’ve passed on a message to an Amish friend with a big, well-known shop in Ohio who’s been making furniture for many years now. If you would like, why don’t you email me at so we can correspond about it that way. I am waiting for his response which won’t be till after the weekend but hopefully we could find something that would work for you.
Erik
While visiting Lancaster just before Labor Day, I had a dead battery while at a yard sale. Luckily Pequea Alternator, an Amish shop, was about 3 houses away. The man and his young son rode their scooters, with a battery and jumper cables, back to my car and got me going again. At his shop, he tested my battery and determined it was dead. He didn’t have the right replacement and neither did any of his distributors that he called. He was able to get me on my way to an English store though, and for that I will be ever grateful.
Rick,
Great story. The folks that run Pequea are nice people. A fairly uncommon business in the Amish community (though not the only one of its kind!).