I’ve been looking forward to this new addition to Amish America for a long time. Various questions seem to recur on Amish topics. I thought it might be nice to put together a resource to try to answer some of those questions. The Amish Online Encyclopedia (AOE) covers a variety of subjects including Amish culture, beliefs, the different Amish affiliations, occupations, education, transportation, and so…
I recently read a book I’d been looking forward to for a long time. An Amish Paradox: Diversity and Change in the World’s Largest Amish Community is an in-depth look at the Amish settlement at Holmes County, Ohio, and one of the most interesting books on the Amish I have read. In Ohio last month I had the pleasure of meeting the book’s authors, Charles…
At a talk I gave in Holmes County, at one point one of the Amish entrepreneurs on the 5-man panel expressed concerns over technology. Paraphrasing, he spoke of worries over “kids having the PSP and the Game Boy and half of the boys having cars”. Having been to a few Amish homes, I can say this is not far off in some communities, where both…
An Amish friend, whom we’ll call “Aaron Miller”, recently discussed aspects of Amish society with a college class. Aaron later wrote a follow-up letter to the class, in which he addressed a few issues raised during the discussion. Aaron has kindly shared the letter, from which we’ll post a few excerpts on the blog. You may remember Aaron, aka “Anonymous Amish Person” or “Mr. X”,…
The ten largest Amish settlements, by number of church districts, as of 2009: 10. Allen County, Indiana (Founded 1852; 19 church districts). This Amish settlement located to the north of Fort Wayne is a Swiss-ethnicity community. Open buggies are driven here; the construction trade is popular. Allen County Amish homes are often built of red brick, unlike those of most other Amish. The three most…
A recent re-read of a piece by Steven Nolt in Mennonite Quarterly Review–‘Who are the Real Amish? Rethinking Diversity and Identity among a Separate People’— made me recall a common dilemma when discussing our Plain neighbors. ‘The Amish’ is a moniker that tries to do more than it really can, which is blanket a group of people having quite diverse practices. Saying “‘the Amish’ this”…
Big Valley, Pennsylvania is home to three main Amish groups–the Byler Amish, Renno Amish, and Nebraska Amish. They’re often known by the color of their buggies–yellow, black, and white, respectively. The somewhat fancy dash of a Byler Amish buggy. Yes, those are keys hanging on the right. You’ve got to start the horse somehow. Some Amish smoke. So this comes in handy. Also for recharging…
Donald Kraybill has written and edited over 20 books and dozens of professional articles on the Old Order Amish, Mennonites, and other Anabaptist peoples, and is the Senior Fellow at the Young Center for Anabaptist and Pietist Studies at Elizabethtown College in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. In addition to his current projects, Professor Kraybill has spent recent months in locations from Texas to Vancouver promoting Amish…
‘Made specifically for the plain people by the plain people’. The Classic boasts ‘unequaled safety’. It is ‘Not just a locked computer’, promising ‘No modem, no phone port or Internet connection, no outside programs, no sound, no photographs, no games or gimmicks’. The ad is found on page 3 of this year’s Lancaster County Business Directory, a collection of advertisements of hundreds of (mostly Amish…
‘Sylvan’, one of my Amish friends in Lancaster County, runs a scooter workshop in addition to milking cows. In Lancaster County and related settlements, you rarely see bicycles–in Lancaster, for instance, there are only a few church districts I’m aware of that seem to allow them. I’ve also seen scooters in use among the Amish of Allen County, Indiana, and I’d imagine they’d be found…