New communities have emerged in Iowa, Illinois, Kentucky, Minnesota, Missouri, and Ontario, which already had long-established settlements, as well as in states without previous Amish communities such as Arkansas, Maine, Nebraska, and South Dakota. Regardless of state, new settlements are distinctly rural. Over half of those founded after 1990 were started in rural counties without a town or city of 10,000 people and without obvious ties to nearby metropolitan areas.14
The years 2006 to 2007 marked a record in settlement expansion, with forty-eight new communities—the highest number ever for a two-year period—averaging a new one nearly every other week. An Amish correspondent writing in Die Botschaft said the new settlements were “popping up like mushrooms.” Another writer enthused, “If the new settlements keep on sprouting up like they have the last 10 years, then in a few years we will be able to hitch old dobbin to the buggy and travel from one to the other.” Still another correspondent confessed that the avalanche of new communities simply “befuddles” him as he tries to “remember them all and who’s moving where. It is kind of hard for our own brains to keep up.”15 In 2010 explorers hunting for land even went to Alaska and Mexico—well beyond the reach of their traditional homelands. For now, at least, the Amish have remained focused on finding available acres in the contiguous United States.16
FIGURE 10.2. Number of New Settlements, 1990–2011. Source: Migration reports in the Diary and other Amish publications.
The sharp spike in new settlements masks three important realities. First, about half (235) of all settlements have just one church district, and these one-district settlements account for only 10 percent of the entire Amish population. Second, it may take a decade or more for a new venture to develop stable roots. Third, a number of these new settlements are likely to falter and disband within several years.
By 2012 Amish settlements in the United States were found as far west as Montana, as far south as Texas and Florida, and as far northeast as Maine. Although the one-district settlements may not be geographically close to other Amish people, they usually have fraternal relationships with other Amish groups and may receive ministerial help from their home community. For example, Swartzentruber ministers from upstate New York regularly make the long bus ride to their newest daughter settlement in Maine to conduct church services for young districts that have not yet ordained their own ministers.
Fading Like Flowers
Although Amish people have planted more than five hundred new settlements since 1900, not all of them have flourished. Amish historian David Luthy has documented the deaths of 144 settlements in North America in the twentieth century. Seven were in Canada, one was in Mexico (1923–1929), and one was in Honduras (1968–1979). In addition, a small Amish settlement in Paraguay (1967–1978) failed. Some other settlements did not fold as communities, but they lost their Amish identity when their members joined Mennonite or similar car-driving churches. To date, the Amish have abandoned all their settlements in seven states (Alabama, California, Georgia, New Mexico, Oregon, South Carolina, and Vermont) and never returned. On the other hand, three settlements in Colorado died between 1914 and 1920, but Amish settlers returned eighty years later, in 2000.17
Settlements may disband for reasons that include poor land, undesirable weather, conflicts with government regulations (state or local), church controversies within the community, and the inability to attract new members. If a newly planted settlement does not recruit a dozen families within a few years, prospective settlers may assume it has problems and shy away from it. Even communities that grow larger and exist for a decade or more may still wither at some point because of other adverse circumstances.18
Amish historian Joseph Stoll has also argued that a central feature of Amish society—lack of centralized and coordinated authority—also contributes to settlement failure. New communities are generally established as grassroots ventures led by a small number of families, not organized or commissioned by centralized church leadership. Stoll explains that the “system of starting new settlements” does not always work, “because … we really don’t have any system. All too often a few random families, because of some common dissatisfaction, band together haphazardly to start a new settlement.”19 New Order leaders have sometimes encouraged members to start new settlements as a means of spreading an Amish witness, but this motive is not typical in other groups.
A study by Joseph Donnermeyer and Elizabeth Cooksey found that the survival rate of new settlements before and after 1950 jumped from 23 percent to 68 percent, suggesting that new settlers may be learning from past mistakes.20 Moreover, they discovered that the survival rate for new communities was highest in counties that already had an Amish community. In some cases, members of the existing settlement help the newcomers or at least have paved the way by acquainting neighbors and civic leaders with Amish ways.
For Amish households, the process of establishing a successful new settlement involves a host of practical concerns that include finding specialized products such as the naphtha gas that some groups use for indoor lighting or securing services such as horseshoeing that might not be available in the new location. The practical realities of new settlements sometimes force districts to modify their Ordnung or else spend more time and money to obtain products and services that were readily available back home.21 Building schools and finding non-Amish drivers to provide occasional “taxi” service for extended trips are all part of the difficult work of establishing a durable new settlement.22
Amish on the Move
Although most families remain rooted in the area where they were born and raised, others move within their home state or to other states. Each year a steady stream of Amish families moves across state lines, and a few cross the United States–Canada border. Some Amish people migrate to start or join a new settlement, while others simply move from one established settlement to another. Interstate Amish migrants travel by rented vans or commercial buses, transporting their household goods, equipment, and animals by commercial haulers.
Amish writer Joseph Stoll notes the “rolling stone” syndrome of some people who “are nomads by nature. Although they may be ever so well-meaning and spiritually concerned, their gypsy-like traits do have an unsettling effect on the permanence of a new settlement.”23 Jacob K. “Oregon Jake” Miller may hold the distinction for being the most mobile Amish man ever. Born in Somerset County, Pennsylvania, in 1852, Miller lived in eight different states and moved twelve different times, always by train. He lived in Oregon three times, once in California, Illinois, Ohio, Virginia, and twice in Delaware, where he lived in retirement after 1921.24
In some ways, Oregon Jake is an anomaly—hence, his notoriety in Amish circles to this day—but his experience is also a reminder that mobility is not an uncommon thing. Indeed, some 2,350 Amish households—about 12,000 people—moved across state lines in the five-year period from 2006 through 2010.25 This number does not include migrations within a state. Table 10.1 shows the interstate gains and losses of ten states in that five-year period. States with large, long-established settlements are more likely to be net losers because some of their families are fleeing urban encroachment upon older communities. The impact of a gain or loss on a state’s Amish community clearly depends on the overall size of that state’s Amish population.
Table 10.1. Amish Household Migration Gains and Losses by State, 2006–2010
Four states in table 10.1 show a net gain of 70 or more immigrant Amish families over the five-year period. New York, surpassing other states with 344 new households, had the largest net gain (231 families), followed by Kentucky (90), Illinois (73), and Kansas (70). The three states with the highest net loss of households were Pennsylvania (315), Wisconsin (84), and Delaware (81). Wisconsin welcomed 217 new immigrant families in the five-year period, but it also lost 301 families, yielding a net deficit of 84 households. Pennsylvania, home to the largest Amish population in 2011 (61,270), welcomed 132 families from other states but lost 447 households
, for a net loss of 315 families. For a state such as Delaware, with a slim Amish population (1,350), the loss of 81 families (about 400 people) over five years is a more severe blow than for Amish-heavy states such as Ohio or Pennsylvania.
Whether setting out to start a new community or joining an established one, migration involves both push and pull factors. Push factors nudging people to leave their homes may include (1) suburban congestion and sprawl, (2) high land prices, (3) tourism and other outside intrusions, (4) disputes with municipal authorities over issues such as zoning, (5) weak regional economies, (6) occupational changes (closing of markets, jobs, factories), and (7) church-related troubles or disputes.
Conversely, other forces may tug families toward new locations. These enticements may include (1) fertile farmland at reasonable prices; (2) nonfarm work in specialized occupations; (3) rural isolation that supports a traditional, family-based lifestyle; (4) social and physical environments (climate, governments, services, economy) hospitable to the Amish way of life; (5) new markets for Amish-made products; (6) a new church-community with certain practices such as supervised youth activities, more or fewer restrictions on technology, or rules against using tobacco; and (7) proximity to family or other Amish groups. Other reasons may be as ambiguous as “the call of the west,” as a Colorado immigrant described his motive for moving from Ohio.
The decision to move is often a conservative choice. For example, when confronting a lack of farmland, Amish people may need to either move or accept the changes that come with increasing participation in the local economy. In such cases the conservative-minded households are often the ones that decide to move rather than change their lifestyles—or their Ordnung—to adapt to new economic conditions. This has happened in Lancaster County, where the growth of microenterprises and work in suburban farmers’ markets provide considerable employment. Some of those hoping to avoid such work and maintain more traditional farm lives have packed their bags. Similarly, some conservative-minded members of long-established communities, unhappy with youth activities or Ordnung changes, move to avoid offensive practices. For example, appalled by what they saw as behavioral problems and lack of discipline among the young folk in their Ashland, Ohio, community, several families began a new settlement in New York’s Mohawk Valley. The choice to stay or to move carries many repercussions for occupation and family life.
At other times, moving has been an economic survival strategy. In the early 1980s, the sharp downturn in the midwestern farm economy prompted more than forty families to move to Stephenville, Texas, where they took jobs as laborers in large English agribusinesses. Viewing their time in Texas as a temporary sojourn to accumulate needed capital, none of the Amish purchased land. By 1993 the settlement had folded because all the households had moved either back to their original settlements or to the sort of older settlements from which they had come.26
Flashpoints
When Amish people plant new settlements, long-time English residents may welcome them or be somewhat indifferent to their arrival. Occasionally, locals resist or resent Amish newcomers. In 2011, a year after arriving in Tripp, South Dakota, Amish people faced the ire of residents upset by horse manure on local roads. Business owners complained to city officials, and one garage owner, tired of manure from the streets sticking to the tires of his customers’ vehicles, called the situation “pathetic.” A month later, residents of Todd County, Minnesota, were grumbling to their board of commissioners about “big piles of horse poop” in the grocery store parking lot and horseshoes destroying the shoulders of their roads. Over the years municipalities in several states have discussed the idea of using various types of “diapers” on horses to keep their droppings off roadways.27
Other flashpoints with horse-drawn transportation have involved the refusal of Swartzentruber Amish to attach the orange slow-moving-vehicle emblems to the backs of their carriages, making them more difficult to see, according to some non-Amish neighbors. Although many states accommodate the Swartzentrubers by permitting silver reflective tape instead of the orange triangles, Swartzentrubers who established new settlements in Pennsylvania in 1997 and Kentucky in 2002 were fined and jailed until the issue was resolved through judicial or legislative action.28
The growing Amish population in Cortland County, New York, created a stir when Amish parents refused to send their children on regular school buses where they would be exposed to the dress and technology of non-Amish students. The school district, required by state law to transport private school students, refused to run special buses for the Amish. School board president Lloyd Parker said, “It’s divided this community big-time. There’s pro-Amish and anti-Amish people.” Just two years earlier, as Amish emigrants from Pennsylvania had begun buying run-down farms in the region and bringing new energy and optimism to an otherwise declining rural region, locals had welcomed the Amish as an economic asset. “Farms are being used,” said an enthused neighbor. “There’s cows. There’s people building instead of things falling in on themselves.”29 In the wake of the school bus controversy, however, some locals criticized the Amish as aloof and an economic drag on local school budgets.
Long-established settlements normally develop amicable relationships with nearby residents and civic leaders. Irritations and controversies most typically flare during the first decade of newly planted communities as Amish people iron out any wrinkles with their new neighbors. In declining rural regions, Amish migrants can spark economic revitalization. In 1989, for example, an agricultural extension agent in Parke County, Indiana, helped to persuade families from Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, to begin a new settlement. Parke County had faced a farming crisis until the Lancaster Amish bought land and revived the dairy industry. County businesses even vied for Amish cash by installing horse-hitching rails, and the state welcomed the newcomers by installing road signs warning motorists of horse-drawn vehicles.30
Similarly, Otsego County in New York’s Mohawk Valley actively recruited Amish families from Pennsylvania to spur economic development. Hartwick Planning Board member Orrin Higgins promoted Otsego County at auctions in Lancaster County by distributing a one-page flier listing farms for sale. He envisioned that, by moving to Otsego County, the Amish could keep their farming heritage and the county would keep its rural character intact. In his words, “It would be a plus for our community if we could encourage these people to move in.”31 By 2002, the county had two Amish settlements.
Table 10.2. Amish Population by State and Province, 2012
Bird’s Eye View
Although Amish people have moved into thirty states and the province of Ontario, 98 percent of them remain in the eastern half of North America (Missouri, Iowa, Minnesota, and states east of the Mississippi River, as well as Ontario). And 93 percent live in just ten states. Table 10.2 shows the big picture of Amish settlements and populations by state and province in 2012. Additionally, although there are some 460 settlements, nearly half (48 percent) of the Amish population resides in the twelve largest settlements, as seen in table 10.3.
Table 10.3. The Twelve Largest Amish Settlements, 2012
Emerging Organizations
The rapid expansion of Amish settlements makes the absence of bureaucracy and the persistence of small-scale community life in Amish society all the more striking. A remarkable number of special-purpose groups and networks that provide some order and coherence to Amish life beyond the local Gmay are emerging. With no national bureaucratic structure, Amish society is loosely linked through networks of leaders, periodic gatherings, committees, and informal organizations that span local districts and often include people from many settlements and affiliations.
None of the associations or committees report to Amish bishops, nor do ordained officials appoint lay people to them. Simply put, there are no church-owned or church-operated agencies or institutions. When lay members form local committees to tackle particular tasks, such as promoting buggy safety or planning teacher-training meetings, they usually
consult with ordained leaders. Ministers, who often attend meetings as quiet monitors, are asked for advice or their blessing on various projects. In general, ministers and bishops rarely initiate new ventures or serve on committees, although they may give tacit approval to them. Yet all Amish organizations, including Amish-owned businesses, exist under the sacred canopy of the Amish faith and reflect its basic values and standards.
Table 10.4 shows a sample of different networks and organizations, varying from loosely coordinated annual gatherings to well-organized commercial operations. The development of mutual aid associations in the late nineteenth century and private schools in the mid-twentieth century were the first institution-building efforts (see chapter 14). Since 1975, the development of Amish organizations and networks has picked up speed. Some of the regional and national networks assist local projects such as private schools, while other associations serve individuals with special needs or interests. A number of associations have newsletters and annual gatherings, often called reunions. Many of these organizations are Amish-developed and directed. Others are hybrids, partnerships of one kind or another with outsiders. Because all Amish organizations are largely voluntary, members of some affiliations, especially the more liberal ones, participate in them much more than members of traditional groups do.
Table 10.4. A Sampler of Amish Networks, Committees, and Organizations
Mutual Aid Associations
The Amish Page 23