The Amish

by Donald B. Kraybill

  * * *

  Robust Growth

  The Amish have enjoyed remarkable growth in the twentieth century. From a meager band of some 6,000 in 1900, their numbers had swelled beyond a quarter million by 2011.1 Since 1960 the Amish population has doubled about every twenty years. In fact, from 1991 to 2012, their population grew from 123,000 to nearly 274,000, as shown in table 9.1. Despite the social and technological upheavals that have accompanied the twentieth century, the Amish, with their emphasis on separation from the world and their penchant for traditional ways, have thrived.

  Only a tiny fraction of this growth has come from converts like Rapinz, however. Groups can grow only by having children or winning converts, and the Amish have grown primarily through natural reproduction rather than evangelism. But producing the children is not enough—they must also be persuaded to join their birthright community. The spectacular growth of Amish society is driven not only by sizable families but also by vigorous retention of young people.

  Table 9.1. North American Amish Church Districts and Population, 1901–2012

  Large Families

  Families in agrarian societies around the world are large in part because children are an economic asset to the labor demands of farm life. With their own long-standing ties to the soil and rural setting, Amish families are no exception. A recent summary of births and deaths in 300 church districts in 60 settlements across 17 states offers a snapshot of the reproductive power in these communities in a single year: 2,356 births and 203 deaths.2 The Gemeinde Register, a newsletter that serves Ohio Amish communities, reports a similar burst of growth: 886 births and 91 deaths in one year.3

  Married Amish women on average have about seven children, far exceeding the overall average of 2.1 births to women in the United States.4 This high reproductive rate fuels the growth of the Amish population. Not only are families large, but almost everyone is producing children. The percentage of unmarried Amish people over 30 years of age is generally below 6 percent, whereas 35 percent of all Americans ages 30 to 34 have never married. The average age of first marriage for Americans, 26.5 years for women and 28.7 years for men, is higher than the average for Amish women (21.1) and men (22.3).5

  Table 9.2. Average Number of Children Born to Amish Women by Settlement/Affiliation

  Although the overall average is seven children, Amish family size fluctuates by settlement and affiliation, as the data in table 9.2 illustrate. Parents in the rather strict community of Buchanan County, Iowa, for instance, have nearly twice as many children (10.2) as the New Order families in Holmes County, Ohio (5.5). Similarly, researchers Charles Hurst and David McConnell found that 47 percent of the Swartzentruber Amish have nine or more children compared with 25 percent for other Amish in Wayne County, Ohio.6 The traditional Swiss communities in Adams County, Indiana, have two more children on average than the more liberal Amish living near Nappanee, Indiana. The pattern is clear: the more conservative the community, the higher the number of children.7

  The traditional Gelassenheit mindset—to accept whatever comes, including children, as nature’s way, with the blessing of God—that characterizes more conservative communities may help to explain this phenomenon. Couples in more liberal communities, shaped by the modern impulse to control the circumstances of one’s life, are more likely to practice family planning, whether by natural or artificial methods. Despite church admonitions against it, strategies for limiting children remain a fairly private matter even in close-knit communities. Indications of family planning in any particular affiliation are apparent not from the number of religious admonitions but from the size of completed families.

  The father’s leadership status is also associated with some differences in reproduction rates. Two research studies found that the families of ordained leaders tend to have more children on average than ordinary families.8 This difference may result because leadership nominees are more conservative and, if ordained, may feel compelled to meet community expectations for large families.

  Will Family Size Decline?

  One of the most sweeping and consequential changes underway in many Amish communities since 1975 is a shift toward nonfarm work. Numerous studies have confirmed that some farm families have more children than nonfarm households, with differences ranging from one to three more children.9 But the association between farming and large families is not always strong. Among the Swiss Amish in Adams County, Indiana, the move away from farming has not reduced family size, nor do the farmers in the Elkhart–LaGrange settlement have large families. Thus, while agriculture as a vocation does not necessarily correlate with family size, the conservatism of a group does.

  Comparing general fertility in Europe and North and South America from the eighteenth through the mid-twentieth centuries, historian Walter Nugent found that fertility rates “at first glance” appear “lower in urban-industrial” societies than in rural ones, “but there are too many exceptions for the pattern to hold.” In many cases, for example, fertility increased for a generation or two after an industrial revolution and declined gradually only when the implications of urbanization had worked themselves out over time.10 Seen in that light, it is possible that the long-term impact of Amish occupational change on family size may manifest itself more vividly in the coming years as the children and grandchildren of nonfarmers complete their families.

  Even though we might expect that Amish family size will eventually shrink with the decline of farming because children, no longer needed for labor, will become an economic liability, several factors may mitigate such a decline. One is that many Amish people have set up small shops and industries that provide chores and apprenticeships for children; thus, the work of children continues to make a valued contribution to the family economy. Another factor is that the strong moral imperative to reproduce that propels growth in Amish society is not occupation dependent but arises from the enduring power of an oft-cited religious directive in Amish writings and oral lore to “be fruitful and multiply” (Gen. 1:22). An esteemed Amish leader, writing in Family Life in 2012, strongly encourages parents to have large families. He cites Solomon’s words in Psalm 127 that “children are an heritage of the Lord … like arrows in the hand of a mighty man … happy is the man that has his quiver full of them.”11 It is morally unacceptable for Amish married couples to decide not to reproduce, and parents rarely delay their first conception. Some couples who are unable to conceive adopt children born to non-Amish parents.

  Finally, even though the majority of Amish people now find work outside of agriculture, virtually all of them continue to live in rural areas on small, child-friendly plots that can support sizable families. Thus, even if family size declines somewhat, it is unlikely that Amish families will soon shrink to the two-child American norm. The Amish experience, given the move to small businesses, the biblical imperative to reproduce, and the rural home setting, may counter the idea that industrialization always leads to smaller families.12

  Seekers and Joiners

  Although converts bring new perspectives to Amish communities, they are not a significant source of growth. Only about seventy-five outsiders have joined and remained members of Amish churches since 1950.13 Some seekers are young adults like seventeen-year-old Kendra, who told us she planned to join the Amish after she graduated from high school. She has lived near an Amish community all of her life, “loves how they live,” and has read twenty books about them. A year ago, “I actually came out and told my parents that I am turning Amish,” she said. “But they aren’t too happy about me joining … I’ve been just taking it slow. … I just have to wait two more years!”14

  Emily, a non-Amish youth from Maryland, decided not to wait that long and was baptized into a Lancaster County Gmay as a seventeen-year-old. “Her parents,” reported one Amish observer, “were bewildered [at first] … but now they seem to accept it better.” Her father admitted, “It’s kind of unbelievable. … But there’s lots of worse things she could have done.”15 Within a fe
w months she left, though, because she had discovered that “the Amish aren’t perfect.”

  More typical are married seekers with children who become disenchanted with hypermodernity and are drawn to the slower pace of Amish life. A project manager in the IT industry, hoping to move his family to an Amish community, told us, “This is not a passing interest.” He continued, “We are not obnoxious tourists. We are earnestly considering this path and … are looking for Amish subgroups that are on the conservative side but not quite Old Order. We need to find a group that is fine with indoor plumbing and with having our horses shod by a farrier versus doing it all ourselves. We are absolutely open to living by the customs and rules (the Ordnung). I know that sounds ironic as I sit writing you an electronic e-mail. At some point I would abandon the use of computers.”16

  After some seekers test-drive Amish life for a few weeks or even years, they discover the difficulty of driving across the cultural bridge to Amish land and shift into reverse. Others continue their journey by living in an Amish community and participating in church and community activities for several years until they eventually request baptism. Some seekers who do not take the big step nevertheless remain closely involved with their new-found Amish friends. A retired Pennsylvania state trooper who considered becoming Amish lived in a small bungalow near Amish families for several years and then decided to join a car-driving Amish Mennonite congregation so that he could continue providing taxi service for his horse-and-buggy neighbors.

  Bill and Tricia Moser switched from mainstream to Amish life in the late 1990s in Michigan. He was an architect, and she was an occupational therapist. After becoming disenchanted with the militarism of their local Protestant church, they moved to an Amish community and eventually joined. “I’d been thinking for a long time that I wanted to shrink my world, create a life where work, recreation, family, and religion were all one, a whole, not so fragmented,” Bill explained. After living in an Amish community, he discovered, “This was the vision I had … their work, their religion and life all integrated together.” The Mosers’ new congregation went through some difficult struggles, leading the couple to consider leaving. But their children, by then accustomed to Amish ways, declared, “If you do that, you will be doing it without us.”17 So they stayed.

  A convert himself to the plain-dressing Old Order River Brethren, Stephen Scott received frequent inquiries from people contemplating joining an Amish community. Some of them had done careful research and held a reasonable understanding of Amish membership requirements. Others did not. Scott recalled a telephone call from a man who wanted to join an Amish group that does not “have electricity and lives like cave people.” After Scott explained the challenges of Amish life, the caller said, “I have one more question: Do they use toilet paper?”18

  Based on many conversations with people prospecting for an Amish home, Scott identifies four types of seekers. Checklist seekers want a church that meets certain specifications. One young man wanted a horse-and-buggy church that would hire him as a youth pastor and also allow him to play gospel songs on a steel guitar. These folks, says Scott, often become “wandering saints who never find a perfect church.” Cultural seekers, imagining that the Amish live a Little-House-on-the-Prairie type of life, are enchanted more by pioneer agriculture than by the religious aspects of Amish life. By contrast, spiritual utopian seekers, yearning for a church that replicates true New Testament Christianity, hope to find it in an Amish community. Finally, stability hunters often come with emotional issues stemming from dysfunctional families and hopes that their problems will be solved in the stable context of an Amish community.19

  Some who join Amish communities have been long-time critics of modern society and sometimes transfer their criticism to the Amish. Converts in general tend to be especially zealous in keeping Amish traditions and regulations. They can become discouraged by the inconsistencies of Amish life and the weak convictions of some birthright Amish who chafe at church regulations. One Amish historian estimates that half of the converts eventually drop out.20

  Converts hail from various Protestant, Catholic, and non-religious backgrounds. One newcomer arrived with Mormon credentials, and a few have come from Mennonite roots. Since the early 1990s, two Amish congregations near Aylmer, Ontario, have incorporated into their fellowship some twenty Russian Mennonites whose ancestors migrated to Canada in the late nineteenth century.21 About half of these newcomers were single men who married Amish women.

  This Canadian example illustrates two patterns about newcomers. First, regardless of settlement, about half of them arrive already married, and most of the others are English men who marry Amish women. Becoming Amish seems to hold more attraction for English men than for English women, although in a few cases English women dating Amish men have joined and then married. Second, joiners tend to cluster in certain communities. The large Lancaster County affiliation, for example, has had only two converts since 1900 (both of whom later left), whereas the smaller settlement in Geauga County, Ohio, counts at least half a dozen newcomers in its ranks.22

  A few converts have been ordained as ministers or asked to fill other leadership roles.23 Baptized in 1966, Catholic-raised David Luthy soon began working for the Amish-run Pathway Publishers in Aylmer, Ontario, and married an Amish woman in 1971. Eventually Luthy became director of the Heritage Historical Library, which holds an extensive collection of Amish historical materials.

  Non-traditional Amish surnames such as Alexander, Coletti, Engbretson, Jones, Johnson, Theil, and Vendley now appear in Amish directories amid the traditional Stoltzfuses, Millers, Yoders, and Waglers. Some of the transplants gather periodically for a “converts’ reunion.”24 Even after many years of living in Amish communities, however, some converts never fully assimilate. One man who was baptized into a conservative group admits that he never got used to “their German coldness. I’m Italian and we hug each other.”25

  Retention and Defection

  In addition to the small influx of converts and high birth rates, the growth of the Amish population is also fueled by the retention of many of its young people. Most of those who defect do so before baptism, but a few leave later in life. Exit patterns vary by historical time period, affiliation, settlement, father’s occupation and ordination, family dynamics, and attendance at Amish schools. The rates reported here combine both pre- and post-baptism defections. Although retention rates in some settlements can be calculated by using family information from settlement directories, an exact national composite rate is elusive because of incomplete records.

  Fluctuating Rates

  The historical evidence shows a decline in defection in some Amish communities in the last half of the twentieth century. Defection in Geauga County, Ohio, for example, dropped from 30 percent for those born during the 1920s to 5 percent for those born in the 1960s. Similarly, the exit of people from the Elkhart–LaGrange community in northern Indiana dipped from 21 percent for those born in the 1930s to 10 percent for those born in the 1950s. The loss of Amish-born people in Nappanee, Indiana, dropped from 55 percent in the 1920s to 16 percent in the 1970s.26

  That retention increased at the very time that Amish people moved into nonfarm work and accelerated their contact with the outside world might seem paradoxical, but two other factors help to explain the trend. The stronger retention rates coincided with the end of the military draft and the rise of Amish schools. Both of these factors insulated children and young people from outside influences. Some eighteen-year-old Amish men performing their alternative to military service in city hospitals in the 1950s and 60s never returned home. Moreover, the shift to nonfarm work mostly pertains to married men, who would be less likely to leave the Amish fold because of exposure to the outside world than would twelve-year-olds attending public schools or single young men working in urban areas.

  Three or more generations ago, most Amish children spent their formative years in public schools surrounded by non-Amish peers, only to spend their adu
lt working lives in agricultural relationships with mostly Amish neighbors. For twenty-first-century youth, the reverse is true: during childhood they attend an Amish school surrounded by ethnic peers and then spend their adult lives working with non-Amish coworkers, customers, clients, and suppliers. So while it may seem paradoxical that retention rates rose as farming declined, the paradox fades in the face of these factors.

  Our study of more than 11,000 children born in the Holmes County settlement before 1980 shows a clear link between defection and affiliation, as shown in table 9.3. In general, the more conservative the Ordnung, the higher the retention. The New Order defection rate (40.4 percent) is fifteen times higher than that of the more traditional Andy Weaver group (2.6 percent). Nolt and Meyers found this same pattern in northern Indiana even when they compared districts within the same affiliation. The most liberal cluster of districts had lost 31 percent of its youth compared with only 7 percent in a more traditional cluster.27

  Table 9.3. Amish Defection Rates by Affiliation in the Holmes County, Ohio, Settlement

  It is difficult to generalize, however, because the defection rate even among liberal affiliations varies, depending on the group, its setting, and its practices. The defection rates of three sizable progressive affiliations—the Old Orders in Holmes County, the Lancaster County Amish, and the Geauga County Amish—are 25 percent, 16 percent, and 5 percent, respectively. These differences likely show the impact of geographical context—people leaving the Holmes County Old Order group have a half dozen or so nearby Amish or Amish-related alternatives, whereas the Lancaster and Geauga dropouts have no Amish groups and few car-driving churches with Amish ties nearby.28 Similarly, defection in the Swartzentruber community in rural upper New York State is lower than in some other Swartzentruber settlements in which youth have exposure and easy access to more liberal Amish groups and, in some cases, help from ex-Amish organizations that assist those who want to leave.29